This galaxy emitted its light 13.1 billion years ago.

It was captured by Webb’s microshutter array, part of its Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec). This instrument is so sensitive that it can observe the light of individual galaxies that existed in the very early universe. This will prove transformational for research. Webb’s capabilities have allowed scientists to observe spectra of galaxies this far away for the first time.

When researchers stretch out the light of an individual galaxy into a spectrum, like the graph shown above, they can learn about the chemical composition, temperature, and density of the galaxy’s ionised gas. For example, this galaxy’s spectrum will reveal the properties of its gas, which will indicate how its stars are forming and how much dust it contains. These data are rich – and have never before been detected from this far away at this quality.

As astronomers begin analysing Webb’s data, we will learn an incredible amount about galaxies that existed all across cosmic time – and how they compare to the beautiful spiral and elliptical galaxies in the nearby universe.

NIRSpec was built for the European Space Agency (ESA) by a consortium of European companies led by Airbus Defence and Space (ADS) with NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center providing its detector and micro-shutter subsystems.

Get the full array of Webb’s first images and spectra, including downloadable files, here.

Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

After 3D printers devoted to space projects were shut down amidst the coronavirus pandemic, an idea to protect those fighting the outbreak on the front line was born.

Space innovation and local cooperation in a time of crisis are joining forces in the fight against COVID-19 to keep essential workers safe.

Instead of printing new materials and bricks for future lunar habitats, two 3D printers at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre (EAC) in Cologne, Germany, were set to work on face shields for hospital workers.

The printers are steadily producing headbands and brackets for Personal Protective Equipment, or PPE, and will be used in conjunction with a filtering mask. This type of face shield is essential in hospitals to protect staff against virus-carrying droplets.

A strong desire to help prompted the team from the "Advanced Manufacturing" activities of Spaceship EAC to offer their open-source 3D printers for producing face shields components as part of a local MakerVsVirus initiative. The design has been optimised through crowd engineering for an efficient and steady production.

ESA contributes its parts to the final product together with a wider hub of makers. The first batch of 50 holder elements has already been delivered to a local collection point, where all components are assembled before the face shields are distributed to hospitals in need. The team plans to continue printing remotely to solve the pressing demand as long as printing materials are available.

The printers were usually busy printing special items for astronaut training and testing ideas for future spaceflight. ESA is investigating how 3D printing could ease the construction, expansion and maintenance of a lunar base.

Before the lockdown, young minds were working on 3D printing new materials made of plastic and Moon dust simulants that could be used to build bricks for lunar habitats. This technology builds a solid object from a series of layers, each one printed on top of the last – also known as additive manufacturing.

The approach aims towards zero waste production and recycling, and gives astronauts the ability to produce components as they need them, rather than carrying a full suite of spare parts.

Read more about this initiative here.

Credits: MakerVsVirus

This Hubble Picture of the Week features a richness of spiral galaxies: the large, prominent spiral galaxy on the right side of the image is NGC 1356; the two apparently smaller spiral galaxies flanking it are LEDA 467699 (above it) and LEDA 95415 (very close at its left) respectively; and finally, IC 1947 sits along the left side of the image.

This image is a really interesting example of how challenging it can be to tell whether two galaxies are actually close together, or just seem to be from our perspective here on Earth. A quick glance at this image would likely lead you to think that NGC 1356, LEDA 467699 and LEDA 95415 were all close companions, whilst IC 1947 was more remote. However, we have to remember that two-dimensional images such as this one only give an indication of angular separation: that is, how objects are spread across the sphere of the night sky. What they cannot represent is the distance objects are from Earth.

For instance, whilst NGC 1356 and LEDA 95415 appear to be so close that they must surely be interacting, the former is about 550 million light-years from Earth and the latter is roughly 840 million light-years away, so there is nearly a whopping 300 million light-year separation between them. That also means that LEDA 95415 is likely nowhere near as much smaller than NGC 1356 as it appears to be.

On the other hand, whilst NGC 1356 and IC 1947 seem to be separated by a relative gulf in this image, IC 1947 is only about 500 million light-years from Earth. The angular distance apparent between them in this image only works out to less than four hundred thousand light-years, so they are actually much much closer neighbours in three-dimensional space than NGC 1356 and LEDA 95415!

[Image Description: A collection of galaxies. On the left side a large spiral galaxy with swirling, twisted arms is flanked by a smaller, but still detailed, spiral behind its arm on the left, and a smaller spiral above it. On the right side is a fourth, round spiral galaxy seen face-on. Between them lies a single bright star. Several stars and distant galaxies dot the background.]

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, J. Dalcanton, Dark Energy Survey/DOE/FNAL/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA; CC BY 4.0

Acknowledgement: L. Shatz

Presented at ESA’s Advanced Manufacturing workshop, this 1.5 m-long hard polymer bar was produced using a 3D printer that is much smaller than it is.

The printer is capable of printing parts of unlimited dimensions in a single direction. It is a ground demonstrator version of 3D printing technology which is ultimately intended for use aboard the International Space Station.

ESA advanced manufacturing engineer Advenit Makaya explains: “Developing out-of-Earth manufacturing solutions for large parts, in a human exploration context such as here and later on for spacecraft structural parts will be essential in enhancing the sustainability and robustness of future space missions.”

Known as Project IMPERIAL, the aim is to develop out-of-Earth manufacturing methods that overcome the build constraints of current 3D printers, enabling easy onboard building and maintenance to enhance the self-sufficiency of future space missions.

“With this activity we have overcome one of the main limitation of 3D printing – the build volume - while using a compact 3D printer capable to process high performance thermoplastics,” notes ESA materials specialist Ugo Lafont. “This is a great achievement that will extend the application field of this on-demand manufacturing process.”

The project is being undertaken for ESA by a consortium led by OHB in Germany, with Azimut Space in Germany, Athlone Institute of Technology in the Republic of Ireland and BEEVERYCREATIVE in Portugal developing the 3D printer.

“Innovating within a working group, – the consortium and ESA technical officers – that fully cooperates and creates synergies, has been a great pleasure,” says Aurora Baptista, CEO of BEEVERYCREATIVE. “It adds to the honor of contributing to an advance that enlarges the concept of being global.”

The company has shared video from a test printing here.

Credits:

BEEVERYCREATIVE

This image shows a slice of the Red Planet from the northern polar cap downwards, and highlights cratered, pockmarked swathes of the Terra Sabaea and Arabia Terra regions. The area outlined in the centre of the image indicates the area imaged by the Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera on 17 June 2019 during orbit 19550. This context map is based on data gathered by NASA’s Viking and Mars Global Surveyor missions.

Credits: NASA/Viking, FU Berlin

SpaceX Crew-2 Walkout and dry dress rehearsal with ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet on 18 April 2021 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

French ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet is returning to the International Space Station on his second spaceflight. The mission, which is called Alpha, will see the first European to launch on a US spacecraft in over a decade. Thomas is flying on the Crew Dragon, alongside NASA astronauts Megan MacArthur and Shane Kimbrough, and Japanese astronaut Aki Hoshide.

The Crew-2 launch is scheduled for 22 April at 06:11 EDT/12:11 CEST.

Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja

Solar Orbiter took images of the Sun on 7 March, from a distance of roughly 75 million kilometres, using its Spectral Imaging of the Coronal Environment (SPICE) instrument. SPICE takes simultaneous “spectral images” at several different wavelengths of the extreme ultraviolet spectrum by scanning its spectrometer slit across a region on the Sun. The different wavelengths recorded correspond to different layers in the Sun’s lower atmosphere. Purple corresponds to hydrogen gas at a temperature of 10 000°C. Each full-Sun image is made up of a mosaic of 25 individual scans. It represents the best full Sun image taken at the Lyman beta wavelength of ultraviolet light that is emitted by hydrogen gas.

Read more

Credits: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/SPICE team; Data processing: G. Pelouze (IAS)

On the day of launching into space on a Soyuz, astronauts go through a number of traditions. ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst will be travelling to the International Space Station on the Soyuz MS-09 alongside NASA astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor and Roscosmos commander Sergei Prokopyev from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 6 June 2018.

After signing the door of the hotel they spend their last day on Earth before launch, they get into their Sokol pressure suits. A Russian orthodox priest blesses the astronauts and launcher as per tradition.

This will be Alexander’s second spaceflight, called Horizons. He will also be the second ESA astronaut to take over command of the International Space Station. The Horizons science programme is packed with European research: over 50 experiments will deliver benefits to people on Earth as well as prepare for future space exploration.

Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja

Solar cells have a hard life in space – their efficiency at converting sunlight into energy at the end of their time there is more prized than their initial efficiency. This next generation solar cell having an area of around 30 sq. cm boosts the beginning of life efficiency of up to 30.9% and end of life efficiency to 27.5% - and in the future designers expect to push this figure above 30%.

Developed for ESA by a consortium led by German solar cell manufacturer Azur Space, CESI in Italy, Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems, Qioptiq in the UK, Umicore in Belgium, tf2 devices in the Netherlands, and Finland’s Tampere University of Technology, this design is a ‘four-junction’ 0.1 mm-thick device containing four layers of different materials (AlGaInP, AlGaInAs, GaInAs,Ge) to absorb separate wavelengths of sunlight.

This design was originated through ESA’s Technology Research Programme with further development and qualification testing supported through the Agency’s ARTES, Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems, programme. It is currently intended to fly with ESA’s next generation Neosat telecom satellites.

Credits: Azur Space

A view of Earth captured by one of the MCAM selfie cameras on board of the European-Japanese Mercury mission BepiColombo, as the spacecraft zoomed past the planet during its first and only Earth flyby. The image was taken at 03:35 UTC on 10 April 2020, shortly before the closest approach, from around 18 600 km away.

Launched into an orbit around the Sun in October 2018, BepiColombo returned to Earth to take advantage of its gravity to steer its trajectory deeper into the inner Solar System. The spacecraft was visible during the manoeuvre to astronomers, including amateurs, equipped with small telescopes and located south of Rome and Madrid. The Earth flyby was the first of nine gravity-assist manoeuvres that will help BepiColombo to gradually home in on its target orbit around the smallest and innermost planet of the Solar System.

Travelling towards the Sun, BepiColombo has to constantly brake against the star’s powerful gravitational pull in order to be able to stop at Mercury. Comprising of the ESA-owned Mercury Planetary Orbiter, the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and the ESA-built Mercury Transfer Module, the spacecraft will perform next two gravity-assist manoeuvres at Venus and further six at Mercury before commencing its science operations in early 2026.

Credits: ESA/BepiColombo/MTM, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over Gangotri, one of the largest glaciers in the Himalayas and one of the main sources of water for the Ganges River.

This huge ball of stars — around 100 billion in total — is an elliptical galaxy located some 55 million light-years away from us. Known as Messier 89, this galaxy appears to be perfectly spherical; this is unusual for elliptical galaxies, which tend to be elongated ellipsoids. The apparently spherical nature of Messier 89 could, however, be a trick of perspective, and be caused by its orientation relative to the Earth.

Messier 89 is slightly smaller than the Milky Way, but has a few interesting features that stretch far out into the surrounding space. One structure of gas and dust extends up to 150 000 light-years out from the galaxy’s centre, which is known to house a supermassive black hole. Jets of heated particles reach out to 100 000 light-years from the galaxy, suggesting that Messier 89 may have once been far more active — perhaps an active quasar or radio galaxy — than it is now. It is also surrounded by an extensive system of shells and plumes, which may have been caused by past mergers with smaller galaxies — and implies that Messier 89 as we know it may have formed in the relatively recent past.

Messier 89 was discovered by astronomer Charles Messier in 1781, when Messier had been cataloguing astronomical objects for 23 years — ever since he mistook a faint object in the sky for Halley’s Comet. Upon closer inspection, he realised the object was actually the Crab Nebula. To prevent other astronomers from making the same error, he decided to catalogue all the bright, deep-sky objects that could potentially be mistaken for comets. His methodical observations of the night sky led to the first comprehensive catalogue of astronomical objects: the Messier catalogue! Messier 89 holds the record for being the last ever giant elliptical to be found by Messier, and the most perfectly spherical galaxy in the entire catalogue of 110 objects.

The glacier’s terminus is called Gomukh, which means ‘mouth of a cow’, presumed to describe what the snout of this huge glacier once resembled. Importantly, the headwaters of the Bhagirathi River form here. In Hindu culture and mythology, this is considered to be the source of the Ganges and consequentially the destination for many spiritual pilgrimages and treks. Gomukh is a 20 km trek from the village of Gangotri, which is in the top left of the image. While Gomukh and Gangotri have much spiritual significance, the Bhagirathi River offers an important supply of freshwater as well as power as it passes through a number of power stations, including the Tehri hydroelectric complex 200 km downstream (not pictured).

Gangotri is in an area also known as ‘the third pole’, which encompasses the Himalaya-Hindu Kush mountain range and the Tibetan Plateau. The high-altitude ice fields in this region contain the largest reserve of freshwater outside the polar regions. With such a large portion of the world’s population dependent on water from these cold heights, changes in the size and flow of these glaciers can bring serious consequences for society by affecting the amount of water arriving downstream.

From the vantage point of space, satellites, such as the Copernicus Sentinels, provide essential information to monitor the changing face of Earth’s glaciers, which are typically in remote regions and therefore difficult to monitor systematically from the ground.

This image, which was captured on 7 January 2018, is also featured on the Earth from Space video programme.

Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), processed by ESA,CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

The upper stage of Ariane 5 which will transport the James Webb Space Telescope in space, is now integrated with the Ariane 5 core stage inside the launch vehicle integration building at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana.

The upper stage arrived at the launch vehicle integration building on 11 November 2021 where it joined the Ariane 5 core stage and boosters. It was then hoisted high to awaiting engineers so that it could be integrated on top of the core stage.

The Ariane 5 upper stage is powered by the HM7B engine. It will contain 14.7 t of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen propellant to deliver 6.6 t of thrust for 1000 seconds. After core stage separation, the upper stage will provide attitude control during the ascent and separation of Webb on its path to the Lagrange point.

The Vehicle Equipment Bay, ‘the brain’ of Ariane 5, which is integrated with the upper stage, autonomously controls the whole vehicle and transmits all key flight parameters to the ground station network.

Webb will be the largest, most powerful telescope ever launched into space. As part of an international collaboration agreement, ESA is providing the telescope’s launch service using the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. Working with partners, ESA was responsible for the development and qualification of Ariane 5 adaptations for the Webb mission and for the procurement of the launch service by Arianespace.

Webb is an international partnership between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

These activities mark the beginning of a five-week campaign to prepare the Ariane 5 launch vehicle which runs in parallel with teams preparing Webb, which started three weeks earlier. Soon Webb will meet Ariane 5 and teams will unite for the final integration for launch.

Find out more about Webb in ESA’s launch kit.

Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - S.Martin

This image shows a globular cluster known as NGC 1651. Like the object in another recent Picture of the Week, it is located about 162 000 light-years away in the largest and brightest of the Milky Way’s satellite galaxies, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). A notable feature of this image is that the globular cluster almost fills the entire image, even though globular clusters are only about 10 to 300 light-years in diameter (NGC 1651 has a diameter of roughly 120 light-years). In contrast, there are numerous Hubble Pictures of the Week that feature entire galaxies — which can be tens or hundreds of millions of light-years in diameter — that also more or less fill the whole image.

A common misconception is that Hubble and other large telescopes manage to observe wildly differently sized celestial objects by zooming in on them, as one would with a specialised camera here on Earth. However, whilst small telescopes might have the option to zoom in and out to a certain extent, large telescopes do not. Each telescope’s instrument has a fixed ‘field of view’ (the size of the region of sky that it can observe in a single observation). For example, the ultraviolet/visible light channel of Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), the channel and instrument that were used to collect the data used in this image, has a field of view roughly one twelfth the diameter of the Moon as seen from Earth. Whenever WFC3 makes an observation, that is the size of the region of sky that it can observe.

The reason that Hubble can observe objects of such wildly different sizes is two-fold. Firstly, the distance to an object will determine how big it appears to be from Earth, so entire galaxies that are relatively far away might take up the same amount of space in the sky as a globular cluster like NGC 1651 that is relatively close by. In fact, there's a distant spiral galaxy lurking in this image, directly left of the cluster — though undoubtedly much larger than this star cluster, it appears small enough here to blend in with foreground stars! Secondly, multiple images spanning different parts of the sky can be mosaiced together to create single images of objects that are too big for Hubble’s field of view. This is a very complex task and is not typically done for Pictures of the Week, but it has been done for some of Hubble’s most iconic images.

[Image Description: A spherical collection of stars, which fills the whole view. The stars merge into a bright, bluish core in the centre, and form a sparse band around that out to the edges of the image. A few stars lie in front of the cluster, with visible diffraction spikes. The background is dark black.]

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, L. Girardi, F. Niederhofer; CC BY 4.0

A replica of Europe's first radar satellite ERS-1 stands beside the entrance of ESA's largest establishment and technical heart: ESTEC, the European Space Research and Technology Centre, in Noordwijk, the Netherlands.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, essential testing for future space missions continues in ESTEC's laboratories and its full-sized satellite Test Centre.

Credits: ESA-G. Porter

The second European Service Module that will power the Orion spacecraft on a crewed flyby of the Moon is fitted with a special engine at Airbus facilities in Germany.

This engine belonged to Space Shuttle Atlantis, and is one of five refurbished engines to be paired with the first five European Service Modules. Technicians carefully install the engine in Airbus’ cleanroom.

ESM is the powerhouse of NASA’s Orion spacecraft. It will provide critical functions such as the propulsion system to get astronauts to the Moon, and the consumables astronauts need to stay alive.

ESM-2 will fuel the crewed Orion spacecraft during a flyby of the Moon for Artemis 2 and is currently undergoing integration and other testing in Europe before it is delivered to NASA this summer.

Meanwhile in the United States, the first European Service Module is making its way to the launch pad as part of the Orion spacecraft for the Artemis 1 mission test flight later this year. Next stop is fuelling, due to take place next week.

ESM is ESA’s contribution to NASA’s Artemis programme and includes involvement from 10 European nations.

ESA recently signed a contract with Airbus for the construction of three more European Service Modules (ESM) for Orion. These modules will be used for the Artemis IV to VI missions. The first two Modules in the contract are part of Europe’s contribution to the international lunar Gateway – a new space station around the Moon.

Credits: Airbus

ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer and his NASA crew mates Raja Chari, Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron arrive at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA on 25 October 2021.

Collectively, the astronauts make up Crew-3 and will travel to the International Space Station on the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft “Endurance”. The first launch opportunity for Crew-3 is 07:21 CET (06:21 GMT, 02:21 EDT) Sunday 31 October 2021, with a backup date of 3 November.

The name of Matthias’s mission is “Cosmic Kiss”. This is Matthias’s first mission, and he will be the 600th human to fly to space.

Once in orbit, Matthias will spend around six months living and working in microgravity as he supports more than 35 European experiments and numerous international experiments on board.

Matthias is also certified to perform Extra Vehicular Activity (EVA) in both the Russian Orlan and American EMU spacesuits. He is expected to perform a Russian spacewalk during his mission as part of initial operations for the European Robotic Arm (ERA) that was launched to the Station in July 2021.

Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja

The swirling spiral galaxy in this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Picture of the Week is NGC 3285B, which resides 137 million light-years away in the constellation Hydra (The Water Snake). Hydra has the largest area of the 88 constellations that cover the entire sky in a celestial patchwork. It’s also the longest constellation, stretching 100 degrees across the sky. It would take nearly 200 full Moons, placed side by side, to reach from one side of the constellation to the other.

NGC 3285B is a member of the Hydra I cluster, one of the largest galaxy clusters in the nearby Universe. Galaxy clusters are collections of hundreds to thousands of galaxies that are bound to one another by gravity. The Hydra I cluster is anchored by two giant elliptical galaxies at its centre. Each of these galaxies is about 150,000 light-years across, making them about 50% larger than our home galaxy, the Milky Way.

NGC 3285B sits on the outskirts of its home cluster, far from the massive galaxies at the centre. This galaxy drew Hubble’s attention because it hosted a Type Ia supernova in 2023. Type Ia supernovae happen when a type of condensed stellar core called a white dwarf detonates, igniting a sudden burst of nuclear fusion that briefly shines about 5 billion times brighter than the Sun. The supernova, named SN 2023xqm, is visible here as a blue-ish dot on the left edge of the galaxy’s disc.

Hubble observed NGC 3285B as part of an observing programme that targeted 100 Type Ia supernovae. By viewing each of these supernovae in ultraviolet, optical, and near-infrared light, researchers aim to disentangle the effects of distance and dust, both of which can make a supernova appear redder than it actually is. This programme will help refine cosmic distance measurements that rely on observations of Type Ia supernovae.

[Image Description: A spiral galaxy with a disc made up of several swirling arms. Patchy blue clouds of gas are speckled over the disc, where stars are forming and lighting up the gas around them. The core of the galaxy is large and shines brightly gold, while the spiral arms are a paler and faint reddish colour. Neighbouring galaxies - from small, elongated spots to larger swirling spirals - can be seen across the black background.]

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. J. Foley (UC Santa Cruz); CC BY 4.0

Quiet please, future International Space Station commander in training. ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti prepares for her upcoming mission to the International Space Station at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Texas, USA.

Samantha is a member of Crew-4 and will launch with NASA astronauts Kjell Lindgren and Bob Hines to the Station from Florida, USA, on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft in 2022.

This will be Samantha’s second mission in space after Futura in 2015 and she is expected to serve as Space Station commander for Expedition 68a, a first for her. Her experience will stand her in good stead as Europe’s first female in command of an International Space Station expedition.

Samantha said “I am humbled by my appointment to the position of commander and look forward to drawing on the experience I’ve gained in space and on Earth to lead a very capable team in orbit.”

She will be ESA’s fifth International Space Station commander and the fourth from ESA’s astronaut class of 2009.

Her nomination comes at a significant moment for European nationals of all genders, as ESA issues a rare call for new astronauts. The deadline for applications to ESA’s astronaut selection has just been extended to 18 June 2021, to accommodate the addition of Lithuania as an ESA Associate Member. For more information about ESA’s astronaut selection visit Your Way To Space.

In the meantime, Samantha will continue training with all International Space Station partners in a programme that includes Space Station refreshers, science briefings, and Crew-4 launch preparation.

Watch a replay of a recent chat between Samantha and ESA Director of Human and Robotic Exploration, David Parker, in which the pair answer some questions concerning her upcoming mission.

Credits: NASA-B.Stafford

Captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission on 21 August 2019, this image features a huge raft of pumice rock drifting in the Pacific Ocean. The pumice is believed to have come from an underwater volcano near Tonga, which erupted on 7 August. The volcanic debris is full of holes and gas that make the rock light enough to float up to the sea surface. Covering a total area of around 150 sq km, this massive gathering of floating rocks has turned the ocean surface from its usual twinkling blue to a dull grey that almost looks like land. The raft is drifting towards Australia, and while it may be causing some problems for sailors, it could bring benefits to the Great Barrier Reef. There are millions of pieces of rock and each is a potential vehicle that offers a ride to small marine organisms such as algae, snails, barnacles and corals. If the raft eventually reaches Australia, the hope is that these hitch-hiking organisms could help replenish the Great Barrier Reef, which has been damaged by rising seawater temperatures.

Credits: contains modified Copernicus data (2019), processed by ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Ariane 5 launch vehicle for flight VA261 sits on the launch pad at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. Flight VA261 will carry to space two payloads – the German space agency DLR’s experimental communications satellite Heinrich Hertz and the French communications satellite Syracuse 4b. The flight will be the 117th and final mission for Ariane 5, a series which began in 1996. Flight VA261 will lift off as soon as 5 July at 23:00 BST (6 July at 00:00 CEST), pending suitable conditions for launch.

Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja

ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer is back in Cologne, Germany, after 177 days in space and 175 days aboard the International Space Station for his first mission ‘Cosmic Kiss’.

The Crew Dragon spacecraft carrying Matthias and his Crew-3 crew mates, NASA astronauts Raja Chari, Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron, splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Tampa, USA, at 06:43 BST/07:43 CEST on Friday 6 May. The journey from Space Station to splashdown took just over 23 hours.

After its water landing, the Crew Dragon capsule was hoisted aboard a recovery boat where the hatch was opened, and the astronauts were welcomed home.

Matthias underwent initial medical checks aboard the boat before being flown by helicopter to shore and boarding a plane to Cologne. He will spend the next weeks participating in debriefings, providing samples for scientific evaluation and readapting to Earth’s gravity at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre (EAC) and the German Aerospace Centre’s (DLR) ‘Envihab’ facility.

Credits: ESA - P. Sebirot

The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over Lake Balaton in western Hungary. With a surface area of around 600 sq km and a length of around 78 km, this freshwater lake is the largest in central Europe.

The lake is mainly fed by the Zala River at its western end. The lakewater flows out near the eastern end via an artificial channel called the Sió, which eventually feeds into the Danube River.

Originally five separate water bodies, the barriers between have been eroded away to create the lake it is today. Remnants of the dividing ridges can be seen in Balaton’s shape – with the Tihany Peninsula on the northern shore narrowing the width of the lake to approximately 1.5 km.

Lake Balaton’s striking emerald-green colour in this image is most likely due to its shallow waters and chemical composition. It is heavy in carbonates and sulphates, and there are also around 2000 species of algae that grow in its waters.

The lake supports a large population of plant and animal species. During migration and wintering sessions, the site is an important staging area for thousands of ducks and geese.

Owing to its pleasant climate and fresh water, the Lake Balaton area is a popular tourist destination. The mountainous northern region is known for its wine, while popular tourist towns lie on the flatter southern shore.

Sentinel-2 is a two-satellite mission to supply the coverage and data delivery needed for Europe’s Copernicus programme. The mission’s frequent revisits over the same area and high spatial resolution allow changes in inland water bodies to be closely monitored.

This image, captured on 27 February 2019, is also featured on the Earth from Space video programme.

Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2019), processed by ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

ESA's Living Planet Symposium – the largest Earth observation conference in the world – is being held on 13–17 May in Milan, Italy. Held every three years, these symposia draw thousands of scientists and data users from around the world to discuss their latest findings on how satellites are taking the pulse of our planet.

Over 4000 participants will gather at the largest congress centre in Europe: the MiCo Convention Centre. With its iconic architecture, this modern building has become a landmark. The event will not only see scientists present their latest findings on Earth’s environment and climate derived from satellite data, but will also focus on Earth observation’s role in building a sustainable future and a resilient society.

In this high-resolution image, captured by Copernicus Sentinel-2 orbiting around 800 km above, the centre of Milan is clearly visible. The famous Milan Cathedral or Duomo di Milano with its surrounding square can be seen in the centre of the image. Taking six centuries to complete, it is one of the largest gothic cathedrals in the world.

Milan is the second biggest city in Italy and, like most large urban environments, it suffers from air pollution. While there is an effort to reduce the emission of pollutants, the city is also incorporating more vegetation into its development plans. This not only makes the environment more pleasant, but the plants also help soak up greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

The Bosco Verticale, or the Vertical Forest, for example, aims to inspire the need for urban biodiversity. The two tower blocks have plants and trees planted on its façade, and are located just north of the historical centre. The vegetation covering both towers is equivalent to 20 000 sq m of forest and home to a variety of birds and butterflies. This vegetation absorbs approximately 30 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year.

Another example of the city’s efforts to ‘go green’, is the Biblioteca degli Alberi, or Library of Trees, visible next to the Bosco Verticale. With its geometric design and irregular patches of land, the gardens are home to over 100 000 plants and trees, interlinked with pedestrian and bike paths.

But it doesn’t stop there, the local government aims to plant another three million trees by 2030.

This image, also featured on the Earth from Space video programme, was captured on 24 September 2018 by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission. With its high-resolution optical camera, it can image up to 10 m ground resolution.

Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), processed by ESA,CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins performs the Grasp experiment in the Columbus module of the International Space Station ahead of the New Year. The experiment studies how the central nervous system, specifically hand-eye coordination, adapts to microgravity.

Grasp stands for Gravitational References for Sensimotor Performance and seeks to better understand how the central nervous system integrates information from different senses, such as sight, sound and touch, to coordinate hand movements and determine what role gravity plays.

How does the experiment work? Mike dons virtual reality (VR) gear that is coupled with a laptop and driven by an audio/graphics system. The VR headset simulates a series of tasks for the him, while a 3D motion tracker updates the display in real time in response to his hand, body and arm movements. Measurements are taken on ground and during spaceflight.

ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet was the first to use the VR gear to perform the experiment during his 2016 mission. ESA astronauts Alexander Gerst and Luca Parmitano followed suit during their respective missions. Watch a video of Alexander performing the experiment.

Researchers suspect that, on Earth, the brain uses gravity as a reference. When reaching for an object, the brain uses visual clues as well as how your shoulder muscles counteract the downward force of gravity to keep your arm straight to calculate the distance between your hand and the object.

However, the sensation of floating for months on end is something our brains did not have to deal with until last century. Seeing how they adapt to this environment offers valuable insight.

Spearheaded by researchers at French national space agency CNES, the study helps us identify the workings of the vestibular system that keeps our balance, and how it connects to the other sensory organs. In other words, Grasp investigates the physiology behind hand-eye coordination, shedding light on how to treat patients showing a loss of vestibular function on Earth.

For astronauts, the research will be useful during spacewalks, where coordination in weightlessness with few visual clues is vital.

Credits: ESA/NASA

ESA astronauts Samantha Cristoforetti (top right) poses with her fellow NEEMO 23 crew outside the Aquarius underwater habitat, located roughly 10 km off the coast of Key Largo, Florida.

NASA’s Extreme Environment Mission Operations takes place more than 18 metres below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. For nine days, astronauts, engineers, and scientists live and work underwater, testing new technologies for space.

Samantha is commander of this year’s NEEMO expedition. Since 13 June, she and her fellow ‘aquanauts’ have been living and working underwater, venturing out of their habitat each day to explore their surroundings through underwater spacewalks.

During these ‘spacewalks’, they are testing prototypes for two ESA devices that will aid in lunar sampling and expedition activities in the future. Their feedback will help refine designs for eventual use during Moon missions.

Last month, Samantha and fellow ESA astronaut Tim Peake prepared for the mission at ESA’s Neutral Buoyancy Facility, one of four immersion tanks of its kind, where they made a wet dry-run, of sorts, to refine the procedures and technology.

The NBF at ESA’s astronaut centre in Cologne, Germany, is regularly used to train astronauts for spacewalks from the International Space Station, but – by finetuning the negative buoyancy of the astronauts and the equipment they use – it can also be used to simulate the partial gravity of the Moon.

Credits: K. Shreeves

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Picture of the Week features the picturesque spiral galaxy NGC 4941, which lies about 67 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Virgo (The Maiden). Because this galaxy is nearby, cosmically speaking, Hubble’s keen instruments are able to pick out exquisite details such as individual star clusters and filamentary clouds of gas and dust.

The data used to construct this image were collected as part of an observing programme that investigates the star formation and stellar feedback cycle in nearby galaxies. As stars form in dense, cold clumps of gas, they begin to influence their surroundings. Stars heat and stir up the gas clouds in which they are born through winds, starlight, and — eventually, for massive stars — by exploding as supernovae. These processes are collectively called stellar feedback, and they impact the rate at which a galaxy can form new stars.

As it turns out, stars aren’t the only entities providing feedback in NGC 4941. At the heart of this galaxy lies an active galactic nucleus: a supermassive black hole feasting on gas. As the black hole amasses gas from its surroundings, the gas swirls into a superheated disc that glows brightly at wavelengths across the electromagnetic spectrum. Similar to stars — but on a much, much larger scale — active galactic nuclei shape their surroundings through winds, radiation, and powerful jets, altering not only star formation but also the evolution of the galaxy as a whole.

[Image Description: A spiral galaxy seen at a diagonal angle. Its very centre is a bright white glowing orb, surrounded by an inner disc of golden light. This is wrapped in a broad outer disc that glows more dimly, with patchy, broken spiral arms swirling around it, filled with small blue and pink star clusters. Dark reddish threads of dust also spiral through the disc, with some strands reaching into the core.]

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Thilker; CC BY 4.0

Overview of the ESA–NASA Mars Sample Return mission.

Bringing samples from Mars is the logical next step for robotic exploration and it will require multiple missions that will be more challenging and more advanced than any robotic missions before. Accomplishments in robotic exploration in recent years have increased confidence in success – multiple launches will be necessary to deliver samples from Mars.

ESA is working with NASA to explore mission concepts for an international Mars Sample Return campaign between 2020 and 2030.

Three launches will be necessary to accomplish landing, collecting, storing and finding samples and delivering them to Earth.

NASA’s Mars 2020 mission will explore the surface and rigorously document and store a set of samples in canisters in strategic areas to be retrieved later for flight to Earth.

Two subsequent missions are foreseen to achieve this next step.

A NASA launch will send the Sample Retrieval Lander mission to land a platform near the Mars 2020 site. From here, a small ESA rover – the Sample Fetch Rover – will head out to retrieve the cached samples.

Once it has collected them in what can be likened to an interplanetary treasure hunt, it will return to the lander platform and load them into a single large canister on the Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV). This vehicle will perform the first liftoff from Mars and carry the container into Mars orbit.

ESA’s Earth Return Orbiter will be the next mission, timed to capture the basketball-size sample container orbiting Mars. The samples will be sealed in a biocontainment system to prevent contaminating Earth with unsterilised material before being moved into an Earth entry capsule.

The spacecraft will then return to Earth, where it will release the entry capsule for the samples to end up in a specialised handling facility.

ESA and NASA are exploring the concepts for these missions, with ESA assessing the Sample Fetch Rover and Earth Return Orbiter. These will provide input to ESA’s 2019 council at ministerial level, where approval will be sought for the missions.

Credits: ESA–K. Oldenburg

This image shows ESA’s next exoplanet mission, Plato, in the Large European Acoustic Facility (LEAF). In this room, the noise of a rocket taking off is simulated. The large room measures 11 by 9 metres and is 16.4 metres high. One wall is equipped with multiple noise horns, that have a similar design as ordinary speakers. Nitrogen is shot through the horns and can produce noise up to 156 decibels. During tests, no one is allowed into the room that is surrounded by a 0.5-m-thick layer of concrete to keep the noise in. Plato passed its test with flying colours.

[Image description: Plato’s structural model sits inside the LEAF chamber in ESA’s ESTEC Test Centre. Plato is put on top of a structure of four wheels. The LEAF room is green and has one wall with huge white holes in the wall. These holes are noise horns that can produce up to 156 decibels. The satellite is surrounded by microphones on sticks to measure the acoustic environment.]

Credits: ESA/ G. Porter

The James Webb Space Telescope is unpacked inside a dedicated spacecraft preparation facility at Europe's Spaceport where it will be examined to ensure that it is undamaged from its voyage and in good working order.

Here, the telescope is set upright in vertical position.

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Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - P.Piron

The lives of newborn stars are tempestuous, as this image of the Herbig–Haro objects HH 1 and HH 2 from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope depicts. Both objects are in the constellation Orion and lie around 1250 light-years from Earth. HH 1 is the luminous cloud above the bright star in the upper right of this image, and HH 2 is the cloud in the bottom left. While both Herbig–Haro objects are visible, the young star system responsible for their creation is lurking out of sight, swaddled in the thick clouds of dust at the centre of this image. However, an outflow of gas from one of these stars can be seen streaming out from the central dark cloud as a bright jet. Meanwhile, the bright star between that jet and the HH 1 cloud was once thought to be the source of these jets, but it is now known to be an unrelated double star that formed nearby.

Herbig–Haro objects are glowing clumps found around some newborn stars, and are created when jets of gas thrown outwards from these young stars collide with surrounding gas and dust at incredibly high speeds. In 2002 Hubble observations revealed that parts of HH 1 are moving at more than 400 kilometres per second!

This scene from a turbulent stellar nursery was captured with Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 using 11 different filters at infrared, visible, and ultraviolet wavelengths. Each of these filters is sensitive to just a small slice of the electromagnetic spectrum, and they allow astronomers to pinpoint interesting processes that emit light at specific wavelengths.

In the case of HH 1/2, two groups of astronomers requested Hubble observations for two different studies. The first delved into the structure and motion of the Herbig–Haro objects visible in this image, giving astronomers a better understanding of the physical processes occurring when outflows from young stars collide with surrounding gas and dust. The second study instead investigated the outflows themselves to lay the groundwork for future observations with the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. Webb, with its ability to peer past the clouds of dust enveloping young stars, will revolutionise the study of outflows from young stars.

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, B. Reipurth, B. Nisini; CC BY 4.0

With giant storms, powerful winds, aurorae, and extreme temperature and pressure conditions, Jupiter has a lot going on. Now, the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has captured new images of the planet. Webb’s Jupiter observations will give scientists even more clues to Jupiter’s inner life.

In this wide-field view, Webb sees Jupiter with its faint rings, which are a million times fainter than the planet, and two tiny moons called Amalthea and Adrastea. The fuzzy spots in the lower background are likely galaxies “photobombing” this Jovian view.

This is a composite image from Webb’s NIRCam instrument (two filters) and was acquired on 27 July 2022.

For the annotated version click here.

For the closeup click here.

Credits: NASA, ESA, Jupiter ERS Team; image processing by Ricardo Hueso (UPV/EHU) and Judy Schmidt

After months practicing with a ‘fake’ Juice spacecraft, teams at ESA’s mission control centre in Darmstadt, Germany, today got in touch with the real thing. For the first time, mission engineers connected to the Ariane 5 rocket and inside its fairing the Juice spacecraft, for a dress rehearsal of the all-important “network countdown”.

The dress rehearsal is the moment that ESA’s mission control brings together the various partners and elements of the mission for a final fully integrated test before launch. Today, Juice’s signals streamed into ESA’s Space Operations Centre via an umbilical connection that will be disconnected in the moments before liftoff, joined by mission partners Airbus and Arianespace.

It is during the network countdown that the Flight Operations Director Andrea Accomazzo performs the well-known ‘final Rollcall’, as he contacts various teams and positions around the globe who each declare – when things are going well – they are “GO” for launch.

The dress rehearsal is a live re-enactment of this countdown and every step has to go right to declare launch readiness, from setting up the connection to Juice on the launch pad to establishing ground station links across the globe and ensuring all mission control software and systems are up and running.

This rehearsal comes after months of simulations in the Main Control Room, in which teams fly a spacecraft simulator controlled by devious Simulations Officers in the room below. Their job is to think up all the ways that something can go wrong.

In this period the teams focussed predominantly on the critical moments after liftoff – the Launch and Early Orbit Phase. Among hundreds of errors, large and small, Juice’s 85 square metre solar arrays failed to deploy, the spacecraft was lost to Earth’s antennas on dozens of occasions and it entered emergency Safe Mode five times.

Now that simulations are complete and dozens of worrying scenarios have been worked through, it’s time to focus on a nominal launch.

“For the last time we have practiced critical operations for the complex Juice mission – and everything went perfectly to plan. Next time, we’ll be doing this for real”, explains Andrea Accomazzo, Flight Operations Director for the mission.

“After speaking to Juice for the first time, we’re ready and couldn’t be more excited for the decade-long conversation about to take place across deep space”.

Juice has now been installed in its Ariane 5 rocket, fuelled, and final checks are underway before it is rolled out to the launch pad at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, for a scheduled launch on 13 April at 13:15 BST (14:15 CEST).

The mission, ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, will make detailed observations of the giant gas planet and its three large ocean-bearing moons – Ganymede, Callisto and Europa – with a suite of remote sensing, geophysical and in situ instruments.

Juice will characterise these moons as both planetary objects and possible habitats, explore Jupiter’s complex environment in depth, and study the wider Jupiter system as an archetype for gas giants across the Universe.

To make all this possible, teams at ESA’s mission control centre in Germany will perform back-to-back critical operations including four planetary flybys to get to Jupiter and 35 flybys of its icy moons.

Credits: ESA

The James Webb Space Telescope is unpacked inside a dedicated spacecraft preparation facility at Europe's Spaceport where it will be examined to ensure that it is undamaged from its voyage and in good working order.

Here, the telescope is set upright in vertical position.

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Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - P.Piron

Under the wing of the Antonov cargo plane that carried ESA's Mercury Planetary Orbiter from Amsterdam Schiphol airport in the Netherlands, to Kourou, French Guiana.

Credits: ESA–M.Cowan

The Ariane 5 launch vehicle which will launch the James Webb Space Telescope was moved to the final assembly building at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on 29 November 2021.

Ariane 5 parts shipped from Europe to French Guiana, have been coming together inside the launch vehicle integration building.

The lower part of the Ariane 5 comprises the cryogenic main core stage (with the Vulcain main engine, oxygen and hydrogen tanks), two solid rocket boosters and the upper composite, including the cryogenic upper stage (with the HM7B engine, oxygen and hydrogen tanks), the vehicle equipment bay – the 'brain' of the launcher, and all supporting structures that will interface with Webb on its adaptor.

A launch table is used to transport the Ariane 5 vehicle between the launch vehicle integration building, the final assembly building and the launch pad.

Webb, now fuelled, will soon be integrated on Ariane 5’s upper stage and then encapsulated inside Ariane 5’s specially adapted fairing.

Webb will be the largest, most powerful telescope ever launched into space. As part of an international collaboration agreement, ESA is providing the telescope’s launch service using the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. Working with partners, ESA was responsible for the development and qualification of Ariane 5 adaptations for the Webb mission and for the procurement of the launch service by Arianespace.

Webb is an international partnership between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

Find out more about Webb in ESA’s launch kit and interactive brochure.

Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique Vidéo du CSG - P Baudon

While most ESA personnel work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic, essential activities continue to take place on site across Agency establishments while following social distancing protocols.

In ESA’s Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory – one of a suite of labs based at the ESTEC technical centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands – testing has continued on critical elements for several missions and projects.

For instance, the lab supported the ‘bakeout’ of the Filter Wheel Assembly for the Proba-3 formation flying mission’s main ASPIICS instrument – which will image the Sun’s ghostly surrounding atmosphere, or ‘corona’ from one satellite while another satellite blocks out the blinding solar disk.

The development of this payload was on the critical path, and the test had to be performed at very short notice just before Christmas. The successful bakeout took place with full personal protection measures in place, in order to host the customers arriving from abroad with the flight hardware.

Focusing on mission external elements, thermal endurance tests are currently underway on multilayer insulation (MLI) materials and solar cell assemblies. These tests are being carried out using the eXtreme Temperature Exposure System, XTES and XTES2 facilities – this latter facility having been procured and commissioned during the pandemic – which can reach and maintain incredibly high temperatures for long periods of time. For example, components of an MLI for the JUICE mission to Jupiter are undergoing a three-month test to address their thermal stability under mission representative conditions.

The lab is also supporting the development of new radiation-resistant coatings, by exposing them to ultraviolet and vacuum-ultraviolet light in the Synergistic Temperature Accelerated Radiation 2 (STAR2) facility).

All the environmental tests are aided by materials characterisation and analysis with state-of-the-art equipment, such as microscopic and spectroscopic analysis, thermo-optical measurements, thermal analysis and more. So the lab’s work has not halted, despite COVID-19 restrictions, but is proceeding as smoothly as possible.

Credits: ESA-Nuno Dias

'Swage' was the word of the day on Monday as ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano carried out the third spacewalk to service the cosmic ray hunting Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer AMS-02. Here Luca is suspended above Earth as he is moved to a he second worksite to swage, or join, the instrument’s tubes to a new pump system that will give it a new lease on life.

Riding on the International Space Station’s robotic arm, Luca soared to the cosmic ray detector’s worksite for nearly five hours of space plumbing.

Yesterday’s spacewalk was the most critical of four spacewalks planned to service the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer that has provided scientists with invaluable data on cosmic particles long after its original three-year mission. In 2017 the decision was made to service the instrument after all four cooling systems wore out.

Luca and NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan began by passing the cooling system to each other as they inched their way from the airlock to the Space Station’s robotic arm. Luca then attached himself to the arm and – aided by astronaut Jessica Meir who operated this from inside the Station – transported the system to the hard-to-reach worksite.

Luca rode the arm into position, seen in this image, and together with Drew screwed the new pump onto AMS. The system was powered on and Luca was moved to a different location by robotic arm for the swage operations. Luca did six swages before taking the robotic arm ride again to the underside of AMS for the last two and finish the job.

The spacewalk was a success, with Luca and Drew finishing their delicate and unprecedented work ahead of schedule. They returned to the Space Station airlock ending the spacewalk at six hours and two minutes. A fourth and last spacewalk for AMS is planned at a later date.

Credits: NASA

The James Webb Space Telescope is unpacked inside a dedicated spacecraft preparation facility at Europe's Spaceport where it will be examined to ensure that it is undamaged from its voyage and in good working order.

Here, the telescope is set upright in vertical position.

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Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - P.Piron

ESA’s ultra-precise deep-space navigation technique – Delta-DOR – tells us where spacecraft are, accurate to within a few hundred metres, even at a distance of 100 000 000 km.

In order to navigate a spacecraft around our Solar System we have to know how far away it is, how fast it is travelling and in what direction. Each of these steps are explained in this new infographic, "How not to lose a spacecraft".

Credits: ESA

ESA’s Large Diameter Centrifuge at the Agency’s technical heart in the Netherlands is seen running here at full speed. The 8-m diameter four-arm centrifuge gives researchers access to a range of hypergravity environments up to 20 times Earth’s gravity for weeks or months at a time.

The centrifuge rotates at up to 67 revs per minute, with its six gondolas placed at different points along its arms weighing in at 130 kg, and each capable of accommodating 80 kg of payload. Multiply those combined figures by 20 g and it adds up to an equivalent mass of 24 tonnes.

Based within a scifi-style white dome at ESTEC in Noordwijk, the centrifuge has been a place of pilgrimage for European researchers for more than a decade including student experimenters on regular Spin Your Thesis! campaigns.

The LDC is popular with life and physical science teams, as well as commercial experiments. Internal ESA teams use the centrifuge to see how spacecraft materials and components would respond to the violent accelerations involved in launching into space.

See what happens to an air and water balloon in hypergravity here.

A next-generation centrifuge has been proposed from an ESA Topical team study: measuring around 200 m in diameter, this “Human Hypergravity Habitat” would be big enough for people to live in a hypergravity environment for months on end.

Credits: ESA –A. Le Floc'h

Jakobshavn Glacier in west Greenland viewed by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission on 29 April 2019. In recent years, Greenland has been losing more ice through this glacier than from anywhere else on this huge ice sheet. Various types of satellite data have been used to understand and monitor the glacier’s flow over the last 20 years. This revealed that the glacier was flowing at its fastest and losing the most ice in 2012–13. In places, the main trunk of the glacier was deflating by 10 m a year as it adjusted dynamically to ice loss and melting. However, information from satellites such as ESA’s CryoSat and the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission show that between 2013 and 2017, the region drained by the glacier stopped shrinking in height and started to thicken. The overall effect is that Jakobshavn is now flowing more slowly, thickening, and advancing toward the ocean instead of retreating farther inland.

Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2019), processed by ESA

The Orion spacecraft with integrated European Service Module sit atop the Space Launch System, imaged at sunrise at historic Launchpad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA on 27 August.

The Flight Readiness Review has deemed the trio GO for launch, marking the dawn of a new era in space exploration.

The first in a series of missions that will return humans to the Moon, including taking the first European, Artemis I is scheduled for launch no earlier than Monday 29 August, at 14:33 CEST.

This mission will put NASA’s Orion spacecraft and ESA’s European Service Module to the test during a journey beyond the Moon and back. No crew will be on board Orion this time, and the spacecraft will be controlled by teams on Earth.

The crew module, however, won’t be empty. Two mannequins, named Helga and Zohar, will occupy the passenger seats. Their female-shaped plastic bodies are filled with over 5600 sensors each to measure the radiation load during their trip around the Moon. The specially trained woolly astronaut, Shaun the Sheep, has also been assigned a seat.

The spacecraft will enter lunar orbit using the Moon’s gravity to gain speed and propel itself almost half a million km from Earth – farther than any human-rated spacecraft has ever travelled.

The second Artemis mission will see four astronauts travel around the Moon on a flyby voyage around our natural satellite.

Mission duration depends on the launch date and even time. It will last between 20 to 40 days, depending on how many orbits of the Moon mission designers decide to make.

This flexibility in mission length is necessary to allow the mission to end as intended with a splashdown during daylight hours in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of California, USA.

Two more dates are available if a launch on 29 August is not possible. The Artemis Moon mission can also be launched on 2 September and 5 September. Check all the possible launch options on ESA’s Orion blog.

Orion is the only spacecraft capable of human spaceflight outside Earth orbit and high-speed reentry from the vicinity of the Moon. More than just a crew module, Orion includes the European Service Module (ESM), the powerhouse that fuels and propels Orion.

ESM provides for all astronauts’ basic needs, such as water, oxygen, nitrogen, temperature control, power and propulsion. Much like a train engine pulls passenger carriages and supplies power, the European Service Module will take the Orion capsule to its destination and back.

Watch launch coverage on ESA Web TV starting at 12:30 CEST here. Follow @esaspaceflight for updates and live Twitter coverage.

Credits: ESA-S. Corvaja

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image of the barred spiral galaxy UGC 12158 looks like someone took a white marking pen to it. In reality it is a combination of time exposures of a foreground asteroid moving through Hubble’s field of view, photobombing the observation of the galaxy. Several exposures of the galaxy were taken, which is evidenced by the dashed pattern.

The asteroid appears as a curved trail as a result of parallax: Hubble is not stationary, but orbiting Earth, and this gives the illusion that the faint asteroid is swimming along a curved trajectory. The uncharted asteroid is inside the asteroid belt in our Solar System, and hence is 10 trillion times closer to Hubble than the background galaxy.

Rather than being a nuisance, this type of data is useful to astronomers for doing a census of the asteroid population in our Solar System.

[Image description: This is a Hubble Space Telescope image of the barred spiral galaxy UGC 12158. The majestic galaxy has a pinwheel shape made up of bright blue stars wound around a yellow-white hub of central stars. The hub has a slash of stars across it, called a bar. The galaxy is tilted face-on to our view from Earth. A slightly S-shaped white line across the top is the Hubble image of an asteroid streaking across Hubble’s view. It looks dashed because the image is a combination of several exposures of the asteroid flying by like a race car.]

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Credits: NASA, ESA, P. G. Martín (Autonomous University of Madrid), J. DePasquale (STScI). Acknowledgment: A. Filippenko (University of California, Berkeley); CC BY 4.0

The galaxy filling the frame in this NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope Picture of the Month is NGC 2566, a spiral galaxy located in the constellation Puppis. In this image Webb’s Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) puts the thick clouds of interstellar dust that suffuse NGC 2566 on display, as well as the galaxy’s compact, bright core.

At 76 million light-years away, NGC 2566 is considered a nearby galaxy, making it an excellent target for studying fine details like star clusters and gas clouds. The new Webb images of NGC 2566 were collected as part of an observing programme (#3707) dedicated to understanding the connections between stars, gas and dust in nearby star-forming galaxies. NGC 2566 is just one of the 55 galaxies in the local Universe examined by Webb for this programme.

To gain a full understanding of the star-formation process in nearby galaxies, astronomers will combine Webb data with observations from other telescopes. At the long-wavelength end of the electromagnetic spectrum, the 66 radio dishes of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) provide a detailed view of the cold, turbulent clouds where stars are born. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has also cast its gaze on NGC 2566, and a new Hubble image of this galaxy was released earlier this week. The Hubble data will help researchers take a census of the stars in nearby galaxies, especially the young stars that are bright at the ultraviolet and visible wavelengths to which Hubble is sensitive. Together, the Webb, Hubble and ALMA data provide a rich view of the cold gas, warm dust and brilliant stars in NGC 2566.

The Webb data are part of a Treasury programme, which means that the data may help answer multiple important questions about our Universe. Treasury data are available for use by scientists and the public without a waiting period, amplifying the scientific impact and allowing exploration to begin immediately.

[Image Description: A spiral galaxy, seen close-up. Its core is a round spot that glows intensely bright, crowned by eight long and spikes that extend across the galaxy, artefacts of the telescope’s structure. Its disc is an oval shape with edges made of very thick and cloudy arms of gas and dust, mostly blue but paler and brighter around patches of stars. Wisps of darker dust also fill the inner disc and swirl off the ends of the arms.]

Credits: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Leroy; CC BY 4.0

This image from ESA’s Mars Express shows a dried-up river valley on Mars named Nirgal Vallis. This oblique perspective view was generated using a digital terrain model and Mars Express data gathered on 16 November 2018 during Mars Express orbit 18818. The ground resolution is approximately 14 m/pixel and the images are centred at about 315°E/27°S. This image was created using data from the nadir and colour channels of the High Resolution Stereo Camera. The nadir channel is aligned perpendicular to the surface of Mars, as if looking straight down at the surface.

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Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

This atmospheric image shows a galaxy named Messier 85, captured in all its delicate, hazy glory by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Messier 85 slants through the constellation of Coma Berenices (Berenice’s Hair), and lies around 50 million light-years from Earth. It was first discovered by Charles Messier’s colleague Pierre Méchain in 1781, and is included in the Messier catalogue of celestial objects.

Messier 85 is intriguing — its properties lie somewhere between those of a lenticular and an elliptical galaxy, and it appears to be interacting with two of its neighbours: the beautiful spiral NGC 4394, located out of frame to the upper left, and the small elliptical MCG 3-32-38, located out of frame to the centre bottom.

The galaxy contains some 400 billion stars, most of which are very old. However, the central region hosts a population of relatively young stars of just a few billion years in age; these stars are thought to have formed in a late burst of star formation, likely triggered as Messier 85 merged with another galaxy over four billion years ago. Messier 85 has a further potentially strange quality. Almost every galaxy is thought to have a supermassive black hole at its centre, but from measurements of the velocities of stars in this galaxy, it is unclear whether Messier 85 contains such a black hole.

This image combines infrared, visible and ultraviolet observations from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3.

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. O'Connell; CC BY 4.0

ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher is talking to ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer who is aboard the International Space Station during the Intermediate Ministerial Meeting (IMM21), where ESA’s Ministers in charge of space activities convened.

Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja

The first complete upper stage of Europe’s new Ariane 6 launch vehicle was packed into a container at ArianeGroup in Bremen for its journey to the DLR German Aerospace Center in Lampoldshausen, Germany. Hot firing tests performed in near-vacuum conditions, mimicking the environment in space, will provide data to prove its readiness for flight.

Credits: ArianeGroup/ Frank T. Koch / Hill Media GmbH

This image from ESA’s Mars Express shows volcanoes, impact craters, tectonic faults, river channels and a lava sea.

This image comprises data gathered by ESA’s Mars Express using its High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on 13 May and 2 June 2021. The colour image was created using data from the nadir channel, the field of view aligned perpendicular to the surface of Mars, and the colour channels of the HRSC. The ground resolution is approximately 17 m/pixel and the images are centred at about 242°E/19°N. North is up.

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Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

This titanium propellant tank, on show in the laboratory corridor of ESA’s technical heart, comes from Europe’s Vega launcher – one of four serving its AVUM upper stage.

The 30-m high four-stage Vega is Europe’s launcher for smaller satellites. Its topmost ‘Attitude Vernier Upper Module’ hosts Vega’s avionics ‘brain’, overseeing the overall flight of the launcher. Then, once it separates from the third stage, the reigniteable AVUM flies like a spacecraft in its own right to deploy its various payloads into their set orbits, achieving metre-scale precision.

ESA’s Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory, based at ESTEC in the Netherlands, played a trouble-shooting role ahead of the first Vega launch back in 2012, after one of these tanks failed to perform adequately during a ‘burst test’ – involving deliberately overpressurising it. Following forensic scrutiny the Lab team discovered that weld quality was the culprit.

They produced a full metallurgical analysis of the tank welds, and came up with new protocols to improve their microstructure – the improved tanks withstanding more than twice their intended operating pressures.

The sixteenth Vega flight is due later this month. Flight VV16 will carry an innovative ‘rideshare’ payload of multiple small satellites and CubeSats.

Credits: ESA–SJM Photography