Astrophysics

NuSTAR

1,919 tracked publications and 52,160 citations from 2012–2026. Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array. Launched 2012. Life-cycle cost: $248M in 2025 dollars. Active Mission Window September 1, 2012 to January 1, 2024: 1,387 publications, 68 top-10% credit.

Pointed Observatory · h-index 91 · 72 papers with 100+ citations · prime mission ended 2014

Lifetime

Scope Papers published from the first full month after science operations begin through 2 years after the mission ends. Citations are counted through the third calendar year after each paper appears. Methods Papers published from the first full month after science operations begin through 2 years after the prime mission ends. Citations are counted through the third calendar year after each paper appears. Methods Every tracked publication to date, with every citation to date. Methods

Key measures

Active Mission Window · papers September 1, 2012 to January 1, 2024
Tracked publicationsTracked publications: peer-reviewed research papers we found for the mission. The list may not be complete. Methods1,387
CitationsCitations received by the tracked publications in the selected scope. The two windowed scopes count each paper’s citations only within its citation window. Methods25,506
Mean citations per publicationMean citations: total citations divided by tracked publications in the selected scope. One blockbuster paper can lift it. Methods18
Median citations per publicationMedian citations: the middle paper’s citation count in the selected scope; half the papers have more, half fewer. A single blockbuster sways it less than the mean. Methods12
Uncited publicationsUncited publications: papers with no citations in the selected scope. Methods27 (1.9%)
Top-10% creditTop 10%: among the 10% most-cited papers from this division’s missions, ranked against papers published around the same time. A paper naming several missions is split evenly among the missions in this division that claim it, so counts can be fractional. Methods68 · 1.4% of division
Top-1% creditTop 1%: among the 1% most-cited papers from this division’s missions within the selected window. Not adjusted for publication year. A paper naming several missions is split evenly among the missions in this division that claim it, so counts can be fractional. Methods2.7 · 0.53% of division
Lifetime indices · every tracked publication to date, in any scope
h-indexh-index: the largest h such that h papers have at least h citations each. It only grows with time, so older missions score higher. Methods91
g-indexg-index: the largest g for which the g most-cited papers together hold at least g² citations. Like the h-index, but it lets the most-cited papers count for more. Methods151
m-index, as of October 4, 2026m-index: a mission’s h-index divided by the years since its first peer-reviewed paper. It falls every 1 January even when nothing else changes, so it belongs to the date shown; it also discounts the long operating life that larger missions paid for. Methods6.1
toritori (total research impact, from ADS): for every paper citing one of the mission’s papers, 1 divided by the citing paper’s reference count times the cited paper’s author count, summed, with self-citations removed. It favors citations from papers with short reference lists and from outside the mission’s own authors. Computed over the tracked citation graph, which can be slightly incomplete. Methods79
riqriq (research impact quotient): 1,000 times the square root of tori, divided by the years since the mission’s first paper. A rate, not a total, so it does not keep growing with age the way the h-index and tori do. Methods555

Tracked publications

  1. First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. I. The Shadow of the Supermassive Black Hole in the Center of the Milky Way

    Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration, 2022, ApJ

    2,232 citations

  2. The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) High-energy X-Ray Mission

    Harrison, Fiona A., 2013, ApJ

    2,109 citations

  3. Swift and NuSTAR observations of GW170817: Detection of a blue kilonova

    Evans, P. A., 2017, Sci

    533 citations

  4. First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. II. EHT and Multiwavelength Observations, Data Processing, and Calibration

    Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration, 2022, ApJ

    433 citations

  5. Discovery of Coherent Pulsations from the Ultraluminous X-Ray Source NGC 7793 P13

    Fürst, F., 2016, ApJ

    368 citations

  6. Properties of AGN coronae in the NuSTAR era

    Fabian, A. C., 2015, MNRAS

    347 citations

  7. Cosmic X-ray surveys of distant active galaxies. The demographics, physics, and ecology of growing supermassive black holes

    Brandt, W. N., 2015, A&ARv

    331 citations

  8. Calibration of the NuSTAR High-energy Focusing X-ray Telescope.

    Madsen, Kristin K., 2015, ApJS

    293 citations

  9. An Embedded X-Ray Source Shines through the Aspherical AT 2018cow: Revealing the Inner Workings of the Most Luminous Fast-evolving Optical Transients

    Margutti, R., 2019, ApJ

    292 citations

  10. A Multimessenger Picture of the Flaring Blazar TXS 0506+056: Implications for High-energy Neutrino Emission and Cosmic-Ray Acceleration

    Keivani, A., 2018, ApJ

    288 citations

  11. The multi-phase winds of Markarian 231: from the hot, nuclear, ultra-fast wind to the galaxy-scale, molecular outflow

    Feruglio, C., 2015, A&A

    286 citations

  12. Discovery of pulsations from NGC 300 ULX1 and its fast period evolution

    Carpano, S., 2018, MNRAS

    281 citations

  13. The outflow structure of GW170817 from late-time broad-band observations

    Troja, E., 2018, MNRAS

    271 citations

  14. Dark matter triggers of supernovae

    Graham, Peter W., 2015, PhRvD

    247 citations

  15. NuSTAR Discovery of a 3.76 s Transient Magnetar Near Sagittarius A*

    Mori, Kaya, 2013, ApJ

    242 citations

  16. NuSTAR Observations of the Bullet Cluster: Constraints on Inverse Compton Emission

    Wik, Daniel R., 2014, ApJ

    230 citations

  17. New Spectral Model for Constraining Torus Covering Factors from Broadband X-Ray Spectra of Active Galactic Nuclei

    Baloković, M., 2018, ApJ

    222 citations

  18. Rapid Variability of Blazar 3C 279 during Flaring States in 2013-2014 with Joint Fermi-LAT, NuSTAR, Swift, and Ground-Based Multiwavelength Observations

    Hayashida, M., 2015, ApJ

    199 citations

  19. The Destruction and Recreation of the X-Ray Corona in a Changing-look Active Galactic Nucleus

    Ricci, C., 2020, ApJ

    195 citations

  20. Repeating behaviour of FRB 121102: periodicity, waiting times, and energy distribution

    Cruces, M., 2021, MNRAS

    192 citations

How we found these papers

We searched NASA’s Astrophysics Data System (ADS) for peer-reviewed articles naming NuSTAR in the title, abstract or keywords; standard filters drop articles that are not peer-reviewed and magazine pieces. SciX is ADS’s current interface.

(((abs:"NuSTAR" NOT (=abs:"Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research" OR =abs:"Facility for Anti-proton and Ion Research" OR =abs:"Nuclear Structure Astrophysics and Reactions" OR =abs:"radioactive beam" OR =abs:"radioactive beams" OR =abs:"radioactive ion beam" OR =abs:"radioactive ion beams" OR =abs:"exotic nuclei" OR abs:((DESPEC OR GSI) AND (nuclear OR nuclei OR isotope OR detector OR beam)))) OR =abs:"Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array" OR facility:"NuSTAR")) AND property:refereed AND doctype:article AND pubdate:[2012-09 TO 2040-01] AND NOT bibstem:("A&R" OR "AIASJ" OR "AeAm" OR "AirSp" OR "AsNow" OR "AsUAI" OR "AvWST" OR "C&E" OR "C&T" OR "CAPJ" OR "E&S" OR "ENews" OR "IrAJ" OR "JCos" OR "JRASC" OR "LAstr" OR "MNSSA" OR "Met" OR "NewSc" OR "Orion" OR "PhT" OR "PhTea" OR "PhuZ" OR "PhyOJ" OR "PhyW" OR "PlR" OR "SciAm" OR "SpFl" OR "ZemVs")

Open in SciX

Removed after review (10)

  1. CIAO: Chandra's Data Analysis System for X-Ray Astronomy and Beyond Describes Chandra's CIAO analysis software; does not name NuSTAR. Decision 🤖
  2. Astrophysics: Black holes in a spin Nature News & Views commentary on another group's result ("See Letter p.449"), flagged refereed+article by ADS; not a research article. Applies the no-news-articles standard in a venue the news-venue bibstem list cannot cover. Decision 👨
  3. A model for the non-thermal emission of the very massive colliding-wind binary HD 93129A Proceedings duplicate of 2016A&A...591A.139D — identical title, same authors (del Palacio, Bosch-Ramon, Romero, Benaglia), two months later. Keeps the journal version of record and drops the double count. Decision 👨
  4. KIT - automated small telescope Errant ADS record: the title "KIT - automated small telescope" is attached to an unrelated conference-talk abstract on Compton-thick AGN observed with NuSTAR. Corrupt metadata, not a publication of record. Decision 👨
  5. Measuring the Masses of White Dwarfs with X-rays: A NuSTAR Legacy Survey (Abstract) Meeting abstract (its title ends "(Abstract)") of Shaw et al. 2020MNRAS.498.3457S — the same NuSTAR Legacy survey of 19 magnetic cataclysmic variables and the same white dwarf mass distribution. Keeps the journal version of record. Decision 👨
  6. ULX NuSTAR J095551+6940.8: A Highly Magnetized Neutron Star in a High-Mass X-ray Binary Proceedings summary of Eksi et al. 2015MNRAS.448L..40E by the same team — the same disk-magnetosphere argument for a >10^13 G field in NuSTAR J095551+6940.8. Keeps the journal version of record. Decision 👨
  7. Hard X-ray view of the γ-ray binary LS I +61°303 Proceedings version of Saavedra et al. 2023MNRAS.525.1848S — the same 55 ks 2017 NuSTAR observation of LS I +61 303 and the same pair of rapid hard X-ray flares. Keeps the journal version of record. Decision 👨
  8. The UK NuStAR Project About the UK part of FAIR's NUSTAR nuclear-physics collaboration; not the X-ray telescope. Decision 🤖
  9. Wilsonian Renormalization Group and the Lippmann-Schwinger Equation with a Multitude of Cutoff Parameters Nuclear theory paper naming FAIR's NUSTAR collaboration in a grant line; not the X-ray telescope. Decision 🤖
  10. Detectors and front-end electronics for nuclear physics research at IUAC Nuclear physics detector review naming FAIR's NUSTAR collaboration; not the X-ray telescope. Decision 🤖