Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope

Fermi Mission History

The table below lists science milestones, data and software releases, and operations events for the Fermi mission. Dates for science highlights typically reflect the announcement or publication of the result.


Date ↓ AO Cycle Event
2008-06-28 0 First blazar detected by the LAT
2008-07-14 0 First GRB detected by the GBM
2008-08-18 1 First GRB detected by the LAT
2009-01-22 1 Magnetar storm from SGR J1550-5418 observed by Fermi
2009-02-19 1 The Fermi team published the results of an analysis of GRB 080916C, the most extreme gamma-ray burst detected
2009-05-10 1 The first short GRB (GRB 090510) detected by the LAT places strong limits on Lorentz Invariance
2010-01-14 2 1FGL Catalog (1-year source catalog) released
2010-11-09 3 Discovery of Fermi bubbles announced
2011-01-10 3 GBM team announced the detection of terrestrial gamma-ray flashes (TGFs) associated with atmospheric pair annihilation events
2011-01-12 3 The detection of hard X-ray variations from the Crab Nebula announced
2011-01-18 3 2011 ROSSI Prize awarded to Bill Atwood, Peter Micheleson and the Fermi LAT Team
2011-01-20 3 Electron-positron beams from terrestrial lightning observed with Fermi GBM
2011-02-14 3 First GBM Earth Occultation Catalog of Sources Above 100 keV released
2011-08-12 4 2FGL Catalog (2-year) released
2011-12-12 4 First GBM Gamma-ray Burst (GRB) Catalog released
2012-03-01 4 First GBM spectral catalog released
2012-03-07 4 Fermi GBM detects gamma-ray lines from a solar flare
2013-04-27 5 The brightest GRB (GRB 130427) observed with the GBM occurs
2013-06-28 5 First LAT High-Energy Catalog (1FHL) released
2014-02-25 6 Second GBM GRB catalog released
2014-02-25 6 Second GBM spectral catalog released
2014-07-22 6 Announcement of the disovery of transitional millisecond pulsars as transient gamma-ray sources
2014-07-31 6 Classical novae revealed as GeV gamma-ray emitters discovery announcement
2015-01-09 7 3FGL Catalog (4-year) released
2015-05-19 7 First GBM Magnetar Catalog released
2015-09-16 8 Second LAT High-Energy Catalog (2FHL) released
2016-04-22 8 Third GBM GRB catalog released
2016-07-18 8 Outburst of black hole binary V404 Cyg produces record number of GBM triggers
2016-08-02 8 Fermi GBM Three-year X-ray Burst Catalog released
2017-02-03 9 Third LAT High-Energy Catalog (3FHL) released
2017-03-16 9 Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs) detected from tropical storms
2017-04-12 9 LAT team delivered the billionth photon to the FSSC
2017-10-16 10 NASA announced the GBM detection of GRB 170817A, coincident with gravitational wave event
2018-01-29 10 2018 Rossi Prize awarded to Colleen Wilson-Hodge and the GBM team
2018-05-09 10 First Fermi GBM TGF Catalog released
2018-07-12 10 Association of gamma-ray blazar TXS 0506+056 flare with Ice Cube neutrino events announced
2019-01-14 11 GRB 190114C became the first reported GRB with TeV emission
2019-02-25 11 4FGL (8-year) Catalog released
2019-07-03 11 Release of Second Fermi LAT GRB Catalog
2020-01-01 12 The GBM surpasses the 2,704 gamma-ray bursts seen by the BATSE instrument on the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory in the 1990's
2020-04-14 12 Fourth GBM GRB catalog released
2020-04-15 12 Extragalactic giant magnetar flare detected as a short GRB
2020-05-22 12 4FGL-DR2 (10-year) Catalog released
2020-06-16 12 GBM Accreting Pulsar 10-year Compendium paper published
2021-05-25 13 GBM 10-year spectral catalog released
2021-12-14 14 Light Curve Repository released
2022-01-27 14 4FGL-DR3 (12-year) Catalog released
2022-02-28 14 The LAT team has delivered 1.5 billion photons to the FSSC
2022-04-15 14 2nd LAT GRB catalog updated to add GRBs detected since the original publication in 2018.
2022-10-09 15 Fermi detected high-energy emission from GRB 221009A
2023-07-31 15 4FGL-DR4 (14-year) Catalog released
2023-07-31 15 Third Pulsar Catalog released