Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, which designed, built, and operated all five of the agency’s successful Mars rovers, has announced that it will layoff more than 10% of its 5500 employees. The news was met with distress from the research community and beyond.
The lab’s director, Dave Gallagher, explained that its leadership is ‘taking steps to restructure and establish an appropriate size to ensure future success’. He explained that these workforce terminations are part of a reorganisation effort that began in July and are unrelated to the current US government shutdown that was triggered on 1 October. The cuts will affect 550 JPL employees across the lab’s technical, business and support areas, Gallagher stated. They were notified on 14 October.
Established almost 90 years ago, JPL’s primary focus is the design, construction and operation of robotic spacecraft, and its larger mission is to explore space and pursue scientific discoveries through robotic space and Earth science missions and is managed by Caltech.
In March, researchers working with Nasa’s Curiosity rover, which was created and is run by JPL, reported finding the largest organic molecules ever identified on Mars – decane, undecane and dodecane.
This latest reduction in JPL’s workforce is the fourth in less than two years. In January 2024, roughly 100 contractors at the lab lost their jobs in a cost-cutting effort caused by budget uncertainties and questions about the fate of the Mars Sample Return mission, the Los Angeles Times first reported. Then, the following month, JPL laid off 530 employees, which represented about 8% of its workforce at the time, as well as dozens of contractors, as a result of a lack of funding in 2024. More recently, JPL terminated another 325 employees in November 2024, to meet the lab’s anticipated tighter budget allocation.
An ‘absolute tragedy’
Representative Judy Chu, whose district includes JPL, said she is ‘disappointed and disheartened’ by the news, particularly following last year’s job cuts. ‘These layoffs are an absolute tragedy, especially as they come at a time when our community is still recovering from the Eaton Fire that destroyed thousands of homes and disrupted so many lives and livelihoods just nine months ago,’ the congresswoman stated.
‘JPL is a national asset that has helped the United States accomplish some of the greatest feats in space and science for decades,’ Chu said. ‘Taken together with last year’s layoffs, this will result in an untold loss of scientific knowledge and expertise that threatens the very future of American leadership in space exploration and scientific discovery.’
One employee who claimed to have worked at the lab for more than a decade told the LAist news site: ‘The JPL that we knew is gone,’ describing an ongoing brain drain and low workplace morale.
Andrew Sinclair, an assistant professor of government at Claremont McKenna College in California, agrees. ‘Really bad news,’ he posted on the social media platform Bluesky. ‘Also, just awful: JPL employees were hit badly by the Altadena fires in January. Undoubtedly there are people here who lost both their house and their job in 2025.’
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