"Small Package, Big Discoveries: The CUTE Mission's Innovative Observations of Extreme Exoplanets"

NASA's Colorado Ultraviolet Transit Experiment (CUTE) mission, launched in September 2021, utilizes an innovative design to observe extreme exoplanets from a small spacecraft. The mission employs a novel, rectangular Cassegrain telescope and a miniature, low-resolution spectrograph to measure near-ultraviolet (NUV) flux, enabling the observation of escaping exoplanet atmospheres. CUTE has successfully observed between 6 and 11 transits of seven different exoplanetary systems, revealing extended NUV atmospheres and potential time variability in atmospheric transmission spectra. The mission's success has led to the adoption of its design approach by other NASA and international missions, demonstrating that precision achieved by large UV astronomy missions can also be achieved by a CubeSat.