NASA announced the 2025 Early Career Faculty (ECF) awards on July 10, recognizing faculty members from several U.S. universities for research proposals that advance space technology and spacecraft operations. The awards fund projects such as diagnostics for high‑enthalpy test facilities simulating spacecraft atmospheric entry and autonomous spacecraft planning using machine learning. Damiano Baccarella of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, will develop resonance‑enhanced multi‑photon ionization diagnostics for arcjet flow characterization. Ciprian Dumitrache of Colorado State University will apply ultrafast laser diagnostics to nonequilibrium flowfield characterization in atmospheric entry studies. Dan Fries of the University of Kentucky will create multiplexed polarization spectroscopy for single‑shot multi‑species diagnostics in high‑enthalpy flows. Yi Mazumdar of the Georgia Institute of Technology will measure temperature, species, and velocity simultaneously with ultrafast laser diagnostics for ground testing of spacecraft atmospheric entry systems. Glen Chou of the Georgia Institute of Technology will develop real‑time hierarchical neural planning and control with system‑level guarantees for onboard guidance, navigation, and control. Roshan Eapen of Pennsylvania State University will research Hamilton‑Jacobi‑aided planning and reasoning for spacecraft maneuvers. Bin Hu of the University of Houston will focus on safety‑enabled onboard planning for autonomous spacecraft using physics‑informed reinforcement learning.