View allAll Photos Tagged spacescience
NASA Apollo astronaut Walt Cunningham in conversation with Charlie Duke, Al Worden, ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet and ESA DG Jan Wörner, on the ESA stand at the 53rd International Le Bourget Air & Space Show in Paris, France, on 18 June 2019.
Credits: ESA - P. Sebirot
This image set showcases three views of the Butterfly Nebula, also called NGC 6302. The Butterfly Nebula, located about 3400 light-years away in the constellation Scorpius, is one of the best-studied planetary nebulae in our galaxy.
Planetary nebulae are among the most beautiful and most elusive creatures in the cosmic zoo. These nebulae form when stars with masses between about 0.8 and 8 times the mass of the Sun shed most of their mass at the end of their lives. The planetary nebula phase is fleeting, lasting only about 20 000 years.
The Butterfly Nebula is a bipolar nebula, meaning that it has two lobes that spread in opposite directions, forming the ‘wings’ of the butterfly. A dark band of dusty gas poses as the butterfly’s ‘body’. This band is actually a doughnut-shaped torus that we see from the side, hiding the nebula’s central star – the ancient core of a Sun-like star that energises the nebula and causes it to glow. The dusty doughnut may be responsible for the nebula’s insectoid shape by preventing gas from flowing outward from the star equally in all directions.
The first and second of the three images shown here highlight the bipolar nature of the Butterfly Nebula in optical and near-infrared light captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The newer image on the right taken by the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope zooms in on the centre of the Butterfly Nebula and its dusty torus, providing an unprecedented view of its complex structure. The Webb data are supplemented with data from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, a powerful network of radio dishes.
While the nebula’s central star is blanketed with thick, dusty gas at optical wavelengths, Webb’s infrared capabilities reveal the central star and show the doughnut-shaped torus and interconnected bubbles of dusty gas that surround it.
[Image description: Three views of the same nebula, presented side by side. The left and middle images, which are labeled ‘Hubble Optical’ and ‘Hubble Near IR’, show the nebula at roughly the same scale. These two images show some similar features, including a dark dust lane that runs through the centre of the nebula and two broad clouds that emerge from either side of the dust lane like the outstretched wings of a butterfly. A diamond-shaped region centred on the dust lane is outlined in each of these images. In the optical Hubble image, the nebula appears clumpy and nearly opaque, with few background stars showing through the cloudy material. The nebula appears in different shades of cream, yellow and orange, with the lightest colours appearing closest to the centre. The background of space is black with a handful of stars that are tinged pink. In the near-infrared Hubble image, the nebula appears cream coloured and most opaque near the centre, then becomes reddish with purple streaks and more translucent out toward the wings of the nebula. There are hundreds of background stars in the image, many of which are visible through the nebula. The third and final image zooms in on the diamond-shaped region near the centre of the other two images. This image is labeled ‘Webb & ALMA, Mid-IR & Sub-mm’. This image is completely different from the other two, showing a bright source at the centre that is surrounded by greenish nebulosity and several looping lines in cream, orange and pink. The upper-right and lower-left corners of this image show a purple streak pointing out of the image.]
Credits: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, M. Matsuura, J. Kastner, K. Noll, ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), N. Hirano, J. Kastner, M. Zamani (ESA/Webb); CC BY 4.0
The Ariane 6 launch pad at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana now hosts the first example of ESA’s new heavy-lift rocket. This Ariane 6 combined tests model will be used to validate the entire launch system during its ground phase in readiness for the inaugural launch of Ariane 6.
The combined tests include filling tanks, and draining them in case of launch abort, count-down automated sequence, and cryogenic arms disconnection and retraction at a simulated liftoff.
These tests will be carried out under ESA’s authority by an integrated team from ESA, ArianeGroup and French space agency CNES.
The Ariane 6 combined tests model is highly representative of the flight model. It consists of the core stage and the upper stage, which make up the central core, as well as three pylons shaped like the rocket’s solid boosters and a fully representative but inert mockup of the fourth booster.
The Ariane 6 combined tests model central core was precisely mated in the purpose-built launcher assembly building, where this task is carried out horizontally. Automated guidance vehicles then brought the assembled core to the launch and, working with the crane at the mobile gantry, raised it to its vertical position.
Ariane 6 is a modular launch vehicle using either two or four P120C strap-on boosters, depending on mission requirements. The P120C engine does double duty, also serving as the first stage of ESA’s new Vega-C rocket.
The reignitable Vinci engine which powers the upper stage allows Ariane 6 to deliver multiple payloads to different orbits on a single launch. After payload separation a final engine burn deorbits the upper stage so that it does not become a debris threat in space.
Ariane 6 development is project-managed and funded by ESA, which also acts as launch system architect. ArianeGroup is design authority and industrial prime contractor for the launcher system and CNES is prime contractor for the Ariane 6 launch base at Europe’s Spaceport. Arianespace is the launch service provider of Ariane 6.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
ESA’s Solar Orbiter carries both remote-sensing instruments to look at the Sun, and in situ instruments that sample the properties of the ‘solar wind’ around the spacecraft. The solar wind is a magnetically propelled outpouring of particles from the Sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona. The particles are electrically charged atoms and electrons that make what physicists call a plasma. By combining data from both the remote-sensing and in situ instruments, we will obtain a more complete picture of how energetic events on the Sun drive changes in the solar wind.
The infographic shows an image of the full solar disc taken by the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) instrument in the top left, along with data from the remote-sensing Spectral Investigation of the Coronal Environment (SPICE) instrument and the in situ Solar Wind Analyser (SWA).
The image and graphs to the right oft he EUI image show the first spectrum captured on 21 April 2020 by SPICE. The image shows the distribution of emission from carbon ions in this small region of the Sun’s atmosphere at temperatures of around 50 000 K. The graph shows the ultraviolet spectra, revealing a wide range of ionised atoms including hydrogen, carbon, neon, oxygen and iron, which can be identified from their unique ‘fingerprint’ in the spectrum. These ions are formed at temperatures from 10 000 to one million Kelvin.
The coloured plot below the images shows the first scientific measurements made by the SWA Heavy Ion Sensor (HIS), which samples the solar wind around the spacecraft.. The data was taken on 11 May 2020. The sensor is able to determine, among other characteristics, the ratio of a particle’s energy to its charge, and its speed across a known distance within the instrument, as given by the time it takes to cross that distance.
This data has then been plotted on the graph along with the theoretical curves of expected ions, which are colour-coded according to the ions in the legend. The coloured patches represent the number of particles (yellow means lots, blue means few) entering the instrument with each characteristic and thus indicate their relative abundance in the solar wind passing the spacecraft.
Through comparison with the SPICE measurements of the coronal composition, this SWA-HIS data will support the establishment of the link between the solar wind passing the spacecraft and its specific source region on the Sun.
Credits: Solar Orbiter/SPICE Team; SWA Team; EUI Team/ ESA & NASA
ESA's 'Science is everywhere' media briefing at the Berlin Air and Space Show in Germany, on 25 April 2018. The highlight of the session was the reveal of the Gaia mission's second data release. Gaia is an ESA mission to survey more than one billion stars of our Galaxy and its local neighbourhood in order to build the most precise 3D map of the Milky Way and answer questions about its structure, origin and evolution.
From left to right, Jan Wörner, ESA Director General, Josef Aschbacher, ESA’s Director of Earth Observation, Günther Hasinger, ESA’s Director of Science, Antonella Valenari, Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium, University of Padua and Anthony Brown, Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium, University of Leiden.
Credits: ESA–M. Pedoussaut, 2018
The winner of ESA’s ‘Graffiti without Gravity’ street art competition has left a permanent mark on the Agency’s technical heart, with this mural on the wall next to ESA’s Compact Antenna Test Range.
Irish street artist Shane Sutton won the Graffiti without Gravity competition in May. Jointly organised by ESA and the Hague Street Art, 10 top street artists from across Europe competed together against the clock to create artworks across 2x2 m canvases.
Then, as a result, ESA’s antenna testing team invited Shane to decorate the entrance to their Compact Antenna Test Range (CATR), used to test satellite antennas in space-like conditions.
“This gave me more than six times bigger than the competition canvas to work with,” says Shane. “And the wall incorporates a corner, so I included related images on each side. It’s fun to paint such a large work – for me it’s all about giving things a go.”
It took Shane two and a half days to finish – and you can watch the entire process here in this time-lapse video.
The mural shows an astronaut in contact with ESA’s Rosetta mission like someone holding a puppet on string, representing the use of antennas – essential to link space missions with their home world. Its background shows the ‘anechoic’ foam spikes that line the walls of the CATR, serving to absorb radio signals and reproduce the boundless void of space.
“I’ve been interested in space as a subject anyway, well before Graffiti without Gravity,” explains Shane. “My first big artwork was inspired by a trip to Munich Airport, where I saw a sculpture of an astronaut hanging out of the roof.
“For what I call my ‘Spacer’ paintings I like to use the narrative of ‘that space in between’ – which I describe as the place after you leave but before you get there. It’s somewhere we all go at some point and I like to represent this through faceless astronaut paintings.
“Things have taken off as my work was retweeted by various people, including astronaut Chris Hadfield, and I’ve been commissioned for artworks by various companies.
“The idea for the artwork gets sketched out first, then I scale it up for the space using a grid, adding different colours to the various blocks as I go, with pure white coming last.”
“We commissioned Shane after seeing the competition,” comments ESA antenna engineer Luis Rolo. “Our idea was to make an artistic connection with the hi-tech activities we carry out.”
“We do a lot of exciting work here in the facility with a lot of different people, from ESA projects as well as outside customers,” adds ESA antenna engineer Eric van der Houwen. “This new artwork gives us a more stimulating environment that reflects that excitement, ripe for innovation and discovery.”
The CATR is one of several ESA antenna test facilities, including its ‘big brother’ HERTZ chamber used for full-size satellite testing in cleanroom conditions.
Credits: ESA–G. Porter
On 6 July, a test deployment of one of the two solar arrays of the BepiColombo Mercury Transfer Module (MTM) was performed during launch preparations at Europe's Spaceport. The MTM will use solar electric propulsion to take the two science orbiters of the BepiColombo mission to the innermost planet, along with gravity assist flybys at Earth, Venus and Mercury itself.
Credits: ESA–B. Guillaume
This graphic summarises significant measurement attempts of methane at Mars. Reports of methane have been made by Earth-based telescopes, ESA’s Mars Express from orbit around Mars, and NASA’s Curiosity located on the surface at Gale Crater; they have also reported measurement attempts with no or very little methane detected. More recently, the ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter reported an absence of methane, and provided a very low upper limit.
In order to reconcile the range of results, which show variations in both time and location, scientists have to understand better the different processes acting to create and destroy methane.
Credits: ESA
The A68 iceberg has recently broken into pieces (the 2 largest bits can be seen in this Copernicus Sentinel-1 image from 28 January 2021).
The iceberg was headed towards South Georgia - due to this recent split it should no longer be a threat to the island's wildlife.
Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2021), processed by ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
A rover makes a fine addition to Europe’s lightsabre collection as it navigates the reddish terrain of a quarry on its own. This is the latest technology demonstration of a wheeled robot for precise sample collection without human intervention.
The sample tubes are a replica of the hermetically sealed samples that NASA’s Perseverance rover is leaving on Mars with precious martian soil inside. To most people on Earth, they resemble lightsabres.
This is the second time engineers from ESA and Airbus come together in Stevenage, UK, to conduct a field trial. “We have made some upgrades and now the rover is complete enough to autonomously navigate unknown terrain, detect and collect samples,” explains Pantelis Poulakis, project manager of ESA’s Sample Transfer Arm for the Mars Sample Return campaign.
This year’s rover trial introduced a novel feature: a robotic arm that faced the challenge of picking up the thin, 15-cm long sample tubes dropped around a simulated depot.
The rover mapped the terrain and located a tube, autonomously navigated towards it until it reached a parking position. At every stop, the rover used stereo cameras to build up a 180-degree map of the surroundings and plan its next maneouvres.
Once parked, the camera on top of the mast detected the tube and estimated its position with respect to the rover. The robotic arm initiated a complex choreography to move closer to the sample, fetch it and store it.
The tests lasted two weeks and involved the rover traveling 300 metres across several obstacles – from flat and straight-line traverses to rocky, zig-zagging setups. The engineers wanted the rover to learn how to scout another planet, dodging boulders and getting close to interesting samples. The rover and its new arm showed they could do their job autonomously.
“We are running these tests to bring together all the technologies we have developed individually,” says Pantelis. “This is essential to gain confidence in demanding scientific and exploration missions on Mars.”
“Each new field trial is an opportunity to boost the European capability to run large scale tests for complex rover systems,” says Geoffray Doignon, Airbus Stevenage technical lead for rover breadboarding activities. “It helps us understand the limitations of the design and validate rover operations in realistic conditions.”
Teams from industry and ESA will push the rover again next year to keep improving its performance. “Progress comes iteratively in small steps and not in one giant leap,” concedes Pantelis.
Follow the latest news about Europe’s martian adventures on the blog To Mars and Back.
Credits: Airbus
ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti is pictured working inside the Microgravity Science Glovebox aboard the International Space Station for her Minerva Mission. She posted this image to her social media on 6 October 2022 with the following caption:
Sometimes you really have to dive into the science… In this case into the Microgravity Science Glovebox which is a sealed facility aboard the
@Space_Station
that allows to conduct experiments that require containment of fluids or small particles. #MissionMinerva
ID: iss067e378312
Credit: ESA/NASA
This image shows an extrapolation of the magnetic field lines emanating from the magnetic structures into the upper solar atmosphere.
Credits: Solar Orbiter/PHI Team/ESA & NASA
Closeup of the Rosalind Franklin rover’s drill delivering a ‘dummy’ sample to the sample tray. The image is of the rover ‘ground test model’ – a replica rover situated at the Rover Operations Control Centre, in Turin, Italy, and used for rehearsing commands.
The rover will be the first in Mars exploration that will be able to retrieve soil samples down to 2 m underground, where ancient biomarkers may still be preserved from the harsh radiation on the surface. Upon retrieval of the samples, they will be analysed in a sophisticated laboratory inside the rover.
Credits: Thales Alenia Space
This image from ESA’s Mars Express shows Mars’ Pyrrhae Regio in wider context. The area outlined by the bold white box indicates the area imaged by the Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on 3 August 2020 during orbit 20972.
Credits: NASA MGS MO-LA Sci-ence Team
ESA's star-surveying Gaia mission has released a treasure trove of new data as part of its ‘focused product release’. As part of this data release Gaia explored Omega Centauri, the largest globular cluster that can be seen from Earth and a great example of a ‘typical’ cluster.
The team has revealed 526 587 stars that Gaia had not seen before, detecting stars that lie too close together to be measured in the telescope’s regular pipeline and those in the cluster core that are up to 15 times fainter than previously seen. The new data reveal 10 times more stars in Omega Centauri; this new knowledge will enable researchers to study the cluster’s structure, how the constituent stars are distributed, how they’re moving, and more.
This image is from today’s data release; it is contrasted against a previous image from Gaia's Data Release 3 to highlight just how many new sources have been imaged in the cluster’s centre. Only faint stars within Omega Centauri are plotted here.
Alt-text: This image shows a star cluster, which appears as a circular collection of bright stars against a dark background. There are so many stars present in the cluster's core that the central region appears to be almost solidly bright rather than comprising individual stars.
Acknowledgments: Michele Trabucchi, Nami Mowlavi and Thomas Lebzelter
Credits: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
The FREND neutron spectrometer on the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter has started mapping the distribution of hydrogen in the uppermost metre of the martian’s surface. Hydrogen indicates the presence of water, being one of the constituents of the water molecule; it can also indicate water absorbed into the surface, or minerals that were formed in the presence of water. A map produced from 131 days data, from 3 May to 10 September 2018, is presented here, covering the globe from 70ºN to 70ºS.
Aside from the obviously water-rich permafrost of the polar regions, the new map provides more refined details of localised ‘wet’ and ‘dry’ regions. It also highlights water-rich materials in equatorial regions that may signify the presence of water-rich permafrost in present times, or the former locations of the planet’s poles in the past.
Credits: ESA; spacecraft: ATG/medialab; data: I. Mitrofanov et al (2018)
Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission on 2 March 2024. The Thwaites Glacier is one of the most unstable glaciers in Antarctica. It is mainly impacted by warm ocean water flowing underneath the ice shelves, causing them to melt from below. As the ice shelves thin, glaciers speed up, sending more ice into the ocean and raising sea levels.
Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2024), processed by ESA; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
This image shows a part of Tithonium Chasma, on the western side of the Vallis Marineris region – also known as the ‘Grand Canyon’ of Mars. The observed area is part of the Western Tithonium Dome. Rocky outcrops are seen at different elevations – best seen when viewed through red-blue stereo ‘3D’ glasses. The structures have been interpreted as the result of erosion – perhaps by flowing water. Bluer hues indicate dust.
The image was created from a stereo pairs taken by the Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) onboard the ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter on 5 February 2019.
Credits: ESA/Roscosmos/CaSSIS, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
This graphic provides an overview of the mosaic and zoomed in images released by ESA’s Euclid mission on 15 October 2024.
On the top left, an all-sky map (41 000 square degrees) is visible with the location of Euclid’s mosaic on the Southern Sky highlighted in yellow. The mosaic contains 260 observations made between 25 March and 8 April 2024.
In just two weeks, Euclid covered 132 square degrees of the Southern Sky, more than 500 times the area of the full Moon as seen from Earth. On the top right, Euclid’s field-of-view in one observation is compared to the area of the full Moon (further explained here).
In the mosaic, the locations of the various zoomed in images are shown. Above the separate images, the zoom factor is given (from 3 to 600 times enlarged compared to the original mosaic).
[Image description: An overview collage of how all the images in article ‘Zoom into the first page of ESA Euclid’s great cosmic atlas’ fit into each other.]
Credits: ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, CEA Paris-Saclay, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, E. Bertin, G. Anselmi; ESA/Gaia/DPAC; ESA/Planck Collaboration; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Ministers from ESA’s Member States, along with Associate Member Slovenia and Cooperating State Canada, gathered in Seville, Spain, 27-28 November 2019, to discuss future space activities for Europe and the budget of Europe’s space agency for the next three years.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
MetOp-SG-A1 and Sentinel-5 on Ariane 6 ready on the launch pad at the European spaceport in French Guiana ahead of liftoff, planned for 13 August 2025 at 02:37 CEST (12 August 21:37 Kourou time).
MetOp-SG-A1 is the first in a series of three successive pairs of satellites. The mission as a whole not only ensures the continued delivery of global observations from polar orbit for weather forecasting and climate analysis for more than 20 years, but also offers enhanced accuracy and resolution compared to the original MetOp mission – along with new measurement capabilities to expand its scientific reach.
This new weather satellite also carries the Copernicus Sentinel-5 mission to deliver daily global data on air pollutants and atmospheric trace gases as well as aerosols and ultraviolet radiation.
Ariane 6 is Europe’s heavy launcher and a key element of ESA’s efforts to ensure autonomous access to space for Europe’s citizens. Ariane 6 has three stages: two or four boosters, and a main and upper stage. For this flight, VA264, the rocket is used in its two-booster configuration.
Credits: ESA- S.Corvaja
Artist's impression of ESA's Earth Return Orbiter.
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/ATG Medialab
Ministers from ESA’s Member States, along with Associate Member Slovenia and Cooperating State Canada, gathered in Seville, Spain, 27-28 November 2019, to discuss future space activities for Europe and the budget of Europe’s space agency for the next three years.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
To understand more about the dark Universe, ESA’s Euclid will measure a phenomenon known as ‘baryonic acoustic oscillations’ that affect the distribution of galaxies on a very large scale.
When the early Universe first expanded, the formation of protons and neutrons created sound waves (bubbles) that rippled through the hot particle-radiation soup. About 300 000 years after the Big Bang, when the Universe had cooled down enough for atoms to form and light to travel freely, these waves froze in place. Over time, slightly more galaxies formed in clusters along the frozen ripples. The ripples stretched as the Universe expanded, increasing the distance between galaxies. Scientists refer to these ripples in the large-scale distribution of galaxies as baryonic acoustic oscillations.
ESA’s Euclid will study the distribution of galaxies over immense distances, teasing out these ripple patterns and determining their size. This enables us to measure accurately the rate of accelerated expansion of the Universe over time and teach us about the nature of dark energy and dark matter.
Euclid is a European mission, built and operated by ESA, with contributions from NASA. The Euclid Consortium is responsible for providing the scientific instruments and scientific data analysis. ESA selected Thales Alenia Space as prime contractor for the construction of the satellite and its service module, with Airbus Defence and Space chosen to develop the payload module, including the telescope. NASA provided the detectors of the Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer, NISP. Euclid is a medium-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision Programme.
Credits: ESA (acknowledgement: work performed by ATG under contract to ESA), CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Axiom Mission 3 crew pose together in their space suits during training.
From left to right, ESA project astronaut Marcus Wandt, Walter Villadei from Italy, Michael López-Alegría, a dual US-Spanish citizen, and Alper Gezeravcı from Türkiye.
Marcus Wandt from Sweden will travel to the International Space Station on Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3). He will spend up to 14 days in orbit conducting microgravity research and educational activities.
Marcus is the first of a new generation of European astronauts to fly on a commercial human spaceflight opportunity with Axiom Space. His mission is supported by ESA and the Swedish National Space Agency (SNSA).
Marcus Wandt was selected in November 2022 as a member of the ESA astronaut reserve after a year-long selection process. The 2022 ESA recruitment campaign received over 22 5000 applications from across its Member States.
Credits: SpaceX
On 22 and 23 November 2022, ESA Member States, Associate States and Cooperating States observers gathered in Paris, France, for the ESA Council Meeting at Ministerial Level (CM22). They discussed how to strengthen Europe’s space sector for the benefit of all - including climate change monitoring and mitigation, secure communications under European control and rapid and resilient crisis response, and the ESA budget for the next three years.
Credits: ESA - P. Sebirot
What do you get if you cross a space agency with a city? A space-inspired, intelligent, digital city!
On 13 June, ESA’s ESOC Operations Centre and its host city, Darmstadt, the 'City of Science', signed a letter of intent, putting on paper their plans to enhance and develop the digital competence of the city.
With a population of about 157 000, Darmstadt is home to many major scientific and technical institutions as well as important architectural landmarks – the photo here shows its Russian orthodox chapel built between 1897-1899.
In 2017, Darmstadt was dubbed a “Digital City” after winning the Bitkom Digital City Competition, due to the implementation of technologies such as smart traffic management, intelligent street lights and waste bins, digital assistance in emergencies and operations on cancer patients assisted by augmented reality.
Now, ESA is bringing its decades of expertise in mission operations to the streets of Darmstadt, including satellite control, satellite data, data analysis and applications of virtual and augmented reality.
The city and the space agency have agreed to cooperate to enhance information exchange, and to identify and implement projects that advance the digitisation of Darmstadt.
After initial discussions, the two have identified the following as concrete areas that are relevant for further elaboration:
— Artificial Intelligence developed in the area of satellite control by ESA’s mission control, and provision of the corresponding spin-off infrastructure, which could be used in the areas of smart traffic, smart waste, security and support for people in need.
— An environmental sensor network taking ground-based measurements, along with data analysis, to be correlated with satellite data.
— Applications of virtual and augmented reality technologies, for example a digital museum and interactive model of the city to support tourism.
There is also the potential for cooperation in the area of 5G, as Darmstadt is currently just one of three cities in Germany, along with Berlin and Hamburg, testing the first 5G technology. As the next-generation mobile network, 5G has the potential to enormously change the way people relate to the technology around them, and satellites play a key role in this.
Over the next six months, a series of workshops with experts from ESOC and Darmstadt will culminate in a report proposing projects for further collaboration – an exciting step towards showing how space technology can improve and enhance or day-to-day lives.
Credits: ESA/R. Jesse
ESA project astronaut Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski from Poland uses an "anti-gravity" treadmill as part of the reconditioning programme to adjust to Earth's gravity.
The device mimics weightless conditions using air pressure to reduce his body weight, putting less strain on joints and muscles.
Credits: ESA - A.Conigli
Present-day disc galaxies often contain a thick, star-filled outer disc and an embedded thin disc of stars. Three major theoretical scenarios have been proposed by astronomers to explain how this dual-disc structure comes to be. Using archival data from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, a team of astronomers is closer to understanding disc galaxies’ origins, and the stellar thick- and thin-disc formation process. The team carefully identified, visually verified, and analysed a statistical sample of more than 100 edge-on disc galaxies at various periods — up to 11 billion years ago (or approximately 2.8 billion years after the Big Bang). The results of their analysis suggest that galaxies form a thick disc first, followed by a thin disc. The timing of this process depends on a galaxy’s mass: high-mass, single-disc galaxies transitioned to two-disc structures around 8 billion years ago, while low-mass, single-disc galaxies formed their thin discs about 4 billion years ago.
This image was created with Webb data from proposals: 1180 (D. Eisenstein), 1895 (P. Oesch), 2079 (S. Finkelstein), 1181 (Eisenstein), 2514 (C. Williams), 3577 (E. Egami), 1345 (S. Finkelstein), and 1837 (J. Dunlop).
[Image description: Two mosaics of edge-on disc galaxies observed by Webb. Each mosaic has eight images, split in two rows. The mosaic at the top is titled “thin and thick disc galaxies.” The mosaic at the bottom is titled “thick disc only galaxies.” Each disc galaxy is centered within a square frame and lies against the black background of space. They appear as thin lines with a slight bulge in their centers. A few of the galaxies are horizontal or vertical, but many are angled diagonally. The thin and thick disc galaxies are overall whiter and brighter compared to the thick disc only galaxies, which are fainter and brown-orange. Text in the bottom right of each box lists the galaxy’s redshift.]
Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, T. Tsukui (ANU); CC BY 4.0
At the invitation of ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson attended the ESA Council at ESA’s establishment ESTEC in the Netherlands on 15 June 2022.
ESA is currently working with NASA on many areas, from science such as the James Webb Space Telescope to exploration such as Mars Sample Return, Artemis and the International Space Station, to Earth observation.
At the ESA Council, a framework agreement between ESA and NASA for a strategic partnership in Earth System Science was signed, as well as a memorandum of understanding between ESA and NASA on the Lunar Pathfinder mission.
Credits: ESA-S.Corvaja
The first Ariane 6 that will be launched into space seen inside its mobile building at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana, 9 July 2024, the day of launch.
The final assembly for Europe's new rocket Ariane 6 is done inside a colossal 90-m tall mobile gantry building.
Hours before liftoff the mobile building rolls 120 m away from the launch pad, allowing Ariane 6 to stand free and be ready for loading of propellant and then liftoff for its first flight designated VA262.
Pumping fuel into an Ariane 6 rocket takes about 3,5 hours, as technicians at the control centre first began by slowly cooling the pipes, valves, tanks and engines from the tropical temperatures in French Guiana of about 30°C down to the super-chilled temperatures of the cryogenic fuels.
As much an art as engineering, the propellants used by Europe’s new rocket Ariane 6 are supercooled to –180°C for the oxygen and –253°C for the hydrogen fuel. At these temperatures, any humidity already in the pipes would immediately freeze and could lead to blocked valves. To avoid this, any hint of air or moisture from the atmosphere is flushed out of the system by the unreactive gas, helium, before fuelling begins.
This Ariane 6 has two boosters set to propel a varied selection of experiments, satellites, payload deployers and reentry demonstrations that represent thousands across Europe, from students to industry and experienced space actors NASA and ArianeGroup.
Ariane 6 is Europe’s newest heavy-lift rocket, designed to provide great power and flexibility at a lower cost than its predecessors. The launcher’s configuration – with an upgraded main stage, a choice of either two or four powerful boosters and a new restartable upper stage – will provide Europe with greater efficiency and possibility as it can launch multiple missions into different orbits on a single flight, while its upper stage will deorbit itself at the end of mission.
Credits: ESA-S. Corvaja
NASA, Axiom Space and SpaceX are targeting 07:31 BST/08:31 CEST (02:31 EDT) on Wednesday, 25 June, for the launch of the fourth private astronaut mission to the International Space Station, Axiom Mission 4 with ESA project astronaut Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski on his Ignis mission.
Follow Sławosz’s journey on the Ignis website, check our launch kit and connect with him on his Instagram and X accounts.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher, together with ESA astronauts Alexander Gerst, Tim Peake, Thomas Pesquet, Luca Parmitano, Matthias Maurer and Samantha Cristoforetti.
Credits: ESA - P. Sebirot
Researchers have discovered frost atop volcanoes near Mars’s equator for the first time – a part of the planet where it was thought impossible for frost to form. The finding used observations from two ESA ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) instruments – CaSSIS and NOMAD – with additional imaging by ESA’s Mars Express.
This image shows frost on the caldera floor of the Ceraunius Tholus volcano. The frost is shown in blue. This blue colour is due to the way in which CaSSIS constructs its images, using both near-infrared and visible channels – a so-called ‘NPB’ image, as opposed to a typical RGB (red-green-blue) image. This combines the instrument's near-infrared (N), panchromatic (P) and blue (B) filters. This provides more information on a feature’s spectral diversity in a large range of wavelengths invisible to the human eye. Read more on how CaSSIS constructs its blue-hued images, and how this allows us to explore the Red Planet.
These four frames show (A) a wide-angle contextual view of Ceraunius Tholus from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s Context Camera, with early morning observations made by CaSSIS overlaid within the blue-toned rectangle. This rectangle is shown close-up in frame (B), with an additional white rectangle marking out an even more zoomed-in image, shown in frame (C). (C) shows ubiquitous frost on the caldera floor, but none on the caldera rim. (D) shows a CaSSIS image of the same region acquired at a different time of day, when there is no frost present. Both the CaSSIS images shown in (B) and (D) were acquired using a similar observing setup, suggesting that the apparent presence of frost is unlikely to be due to any photometric effects. Image (B) was acquired in early northern spring, and (D) in late northern winter.
North is up in all frames, and image scales are indicated in the bottom-right of each frame. The Local Solar Time (LST) is shown for the two frames on the right, as is ‘incidence angle’ (i) and 'solar longitude’ (Ls). Incidence angle indicates where the Sun is in the sky; it is 0° when the Sun is directly overhead, and 90° at the horizon. Solar longitude marks the position of Mars in its orbit relative to the Sun, reflecting the martian seasons through the year for each hemisphere (0° when northern spring begins, 270° at winter solstice).
Credits: ESA/TGO/CaSSIS; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Ariane 6 seen from the skies just hours before it lifts-off for the first time from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana. With the 90-metre-high, 8200-tonne mobile building rolled back, tanking is ready to begin.
Ariane 6 is Europe’s newest heavy-lift rocket, designed to provide great power and flexibility at a lower cost than its predecessors. The launcher’s configuration – with an upgraded main stage, a choice of either two or four powerful boosters and a new restartable upper stage – will provide Europe with greater efficiency and possibility as it can launch multiple missions into different orbits on a single flight, while its upper stage will deorbit itself at the end of mission.
Credits: ESA-S. Corvaja
What do you know about the Moon? This set of infographics illustrates the most frequently asked questions and facts about Earth’s natural satellite.
ESA is teaming up with international partners to explore the Moon as a destination for both robotic missions and human explorers.
Orion, the NASA spacecraft, will bring humans farther than they have ever been before relying on the European Service Module to return humans to the Moon and take advantage of the new technology for human space transportation. ESA is providing service modules that will provide propulsion, life support, power, air and water, and control the temperature in the crew module.
Luna-Resurs is a partnership with the Russian agency Roscosmos that will carry European technology to land precisely and safely on the Moon and to drill into the surface to extract and analyse samples of the lunar terrain.
The Agency is looking at how we could extract and process local resources into useful products and services, such as drinkable water or breathable oxygen on the Moon.
The Heracles mission could take of in 2028 to allow us to gain knowledge on human-robotic interaction while landing a spacecraft on the Moon to collect samples with a rover operated from an orbiting lunar gateway and send the samples back to Earth.
Credits: ESA
We are one step closer to revealing how Earth responds to dangers from the Sun. To make sure it is ready for space, engineers have moved the gold-cloaked Smile spacecraft into the Maxwell Test Chamber at Europe’s largest satellite test facility, ESTEC.
In case you missed it, Smile was unboxed, tested and made whole during the winter. As we enter spring, it enters a new phase – so-called ‘space environment testing’.
Our first space environment test takes place in the special Maxwell Test Chamber. The chamber’s 9 m-high walls, lined with foam spikes, absorb signals and sound, mimicking the void of space. Once its main door is sealed, Maxwell’s metal walls form a ‘Faraday Cage’, screening out all external electromagnetic signals.
Like most spacecraft, Smile is very sensitive. It is designed to pick up very weak magnetic field signals, whilst transmitting a lot of data down to Earth with high-power antennas. Engineers are checking that the spacecraft works well when all its electronics are switched on, making sure that there is no ‘crosstalk’ between them.
Another important part of the Maxwell Chamber tests is to make sure that Smile is safe to launch inside the Vega-C rocket that will take it to space. The rocket and its associated ground systems also carry lots of electronics; we need to be sure that they are not disturbed by Smile, and vice versa.
It will take the team some time to fully analyse the results, but a first look suggests that Smile will pass these tests with flying colours.
Smile (the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer) is a collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).
[ALT-text: A group of 22 engineers in front of ESA’s Smile spacecraft, in the Maxwell Test Chamber at ESA/ESTEC.]
[Image description: In the foreground of the image, 22 engineers wearing cleanroom suits, hair and beard nets, and shoe coverings smile at the camera. They are posing in front of a shiny gold spacecraft, in the centre of the image. The walls of the room in which they stand are lined with blue foam spikes that point away from the wall, towards the spacecraft.]
Credits: ESA
Mount Makalu in the Himalayas is pictured in this Copernicus Sentinel-2B image from 9 December 2017.
At 8485 m high, Makalu is the fifth highest mountain in the world. The iconic pyramid-shaped mountain can be seen just to the right of the centre of the image. It is situated on the border between Nepal and China, about 19 km southeast of Mount Everest, which is in the top left of the image.
Because of the mountain’s knife-edge ridges and its remote position, which leaves it exposed to the elements, it is viewed by many as one of the world’s most difficult mountains to climb.
Nevertheless, Swedish explorer, mountaineer and climate campaigner, Carina Ahlqvist, led a climb this year to raise awareness of climate change and to support ESA’s Climate Change Initiative. During the expedition, scientists collected measurements to help validate data from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 radar mission that are used to study natural hazards such as rock falls and landslides in mountainous regions. The team also surveyed the Barun glacier, which lies at the base of Makalu, to help understand its history and therefore the past climate in this region.
Unfortunately, Carina was struck with snow blindness and had to be evacuated just 300 m from Makalu’s summit. She is now safe and well and the data collected during the expedition are being used to further understand the dynamics of this remote region and how it is being affected by climate change.
This image is also featured on the Earth from Space video programme.
Credits: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2017), processed by ESA,CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet visits the Vega Launch Complex - Zone de lancement Vega (ZLV) at Europe's Space Port in Kourou, French Guiana on 15 June 2022.
Credits: ESA-Manuel Pedoussaut
According to Spain’s national weather agency, Aemet, on 29 October 2024, Valencia received a year’s worth of rain in just eight hours. This deluge caused devastating flash floods, turning streets into rivers, destroying homes, infrastructure, and sweeping away vehicles.
This image shows soil saturation in Spain on 29 October, processed using data from ESA’s SMOS mission. Short for Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity, the SMOS mission is dedicated to making global observations of soil moisture over land and salinity over oceans. The satellite carries a novel interferometric radiometer that operates in the L-band microwave range to capture ‘brightness temperature’ images. These images are used to derive maps of soil moisture and ocean salinity.
The image clearly shows how wet the ground was around Valencia, and also in other parts of the country on the day of the floods.
Credits: ESA
ESA’s Characterising Exoplanet Satellite, Cheops, is getting ready for launch at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. Launch is scheduled on 18 December.
In this picture, taken on 6 December, the Airbus team is performing final checks before lifting the Souyz Arianespace System for Auxiliary Payloads (ASAP-S) and positioning it on the Soyuz Fregat interface ring. The ASAP-S multi-passenger dispenser system will be used to integrate the main passenger, Cheops and the Cubesats into the launcher.
Cheops is ESA’s first mission dedicated to the study of extrasolar planets, or exoplanets. It will observe bright stars that are already known to host planets, measuring minuscule brightness changes due to the planet’s transit across the star’s disc.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG/JM Guillon
Omega Centauri is the largest cluster in the Milky Way, with a mass a million times that of our Sun. During Einstein Probe’s first months in space, observations of the well-known cluster helped to test and calibrate the satellite’s imaging quality.
Binary systems comprising a star with a black hole or neutron star companion generate X-rays when material from the star falls onto its heavy companion. Many such systems call Omega Centauri their home, making it shine brightly in X-ray light. Einstein Probe’s Follow-Up X-ray Telescope observed the structure and core region of the globular cluster.
[Image description: The image is square but rotated 45 degrees on top of a black background and looks like hundreds of blue lights in a diamond shape. A handful of the light dots are bigger, magenta-coloured at their centre, and are located near the edges of the image. Centrally, there are smaller light dots close together creating a brighter centre of the image.]
Credits: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Ariane 6 launches to the sky on 9 July 2024.
Europe’s newest heavy-lift rocket, it is designed to provide great power and flexibility at a lower cost than its predecessors. The launcher’s configuration – with an upgraded main stage, a choice of either two or four powerful boosters and a new restartable upper stage – will provide Europe with greater efficiency and possibility as it can launch multiple missions into different orbits on a single flight, while its upper stage will deorbit itself at the end of mission.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
ESA’s Aeolus satellite ready for liftoff on a Vega rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
Using revolutionary laser technology, Aeolus will measure winds around the globe and play a key role in our quest to better understand the workings of our atmosphere. Importantly, this novel mission will also improve weather forecasting.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
After years of planning and countless hours of simulations, mission teams at ESA’s control centre in Germany are ready to take flight on the long and complex journey to Mercury.
Years of planning and preparation have lead to this moment, and teams at ESOC have been working closely with teams across the Agency, as well as the many colleagues at scientific institutions, in European industry, and of course our mission partners at the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA).
BepiColombo — Europe’s first-ever mission to the innermost planet of our Solar System — will take seven years, travel nine billion km, and will use nine planetary flybys to reach its volatile destination, and it could not be in more experienced hands.
After completing months of simulations, culminating in the the final ‘dress-rehearsal’ on Wednesday, mission teams came together for the pre-launch briefing to confirm the status of all ground systems, ground stations and team readiness.
All systems are GO for launch at ESOC — Europe’s gateway to space.
Live coverage starts at 03:15 CEST, Saturday 20 October, at esa.int/live.
Credits: ESA
This image shows the landscape in and around Greeley crater, a degraded impact crater in the southern highlands of Mars.
This plan view is a mosaic of data acquired by the High Resolution Stereo Camera on Mars Express over 16 of the spacecraft’s orbits (0430, 1910, 1932, 2412, 2467, 2478, 4306, 4317, 4328, 6556, 8613, 8620, 8708, 12835, 14719, 16778). The ground resolution is about 100 m/pixel and the images cover a part of the martian surface ranging from 2°W to 9°E / 31.5° to 43.5°S. North is up.
This colour image was created using data from the nadir channel, the field of view which is aligned perpendicular to the surface of Mars, and the camera’s colour channels.
Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Rollout to the launch pad of the Soyuz rocket with the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft inside, 4 June 2018. The spacecraft will launch ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst into space alongside NASA astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor and Roscosmos commander Sergei Prokopyev from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 6 June.
The 50-m tall Soyuz rocket will propell the astronauts to their cruising speed of around 28 800 km/h. Within 10 minutes of rising from the pad, the trio travelled over 1640 km and gained 210 km altitude. Every second for nine minutes, their spacecraft accelerated 50 km/h on average.
The rocket is rolled to the launch pad on a train, the astronauts are not allowed to see this part of the launch preparation – it is considered bad luck.
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
This image from ESA’s Mars Express shows the terrain surrounding Mars’s north pole. It captures the region where vast, rippling sand dunes meet the layers upon layers of dusty ice covering the planet’s pole.
Numerous labels have been placed across the terrain, highlighting features and regions of note. Be sure to click on these labels to explore the landscape in detail!
This image comprises data gathered by Mars Express’s High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on 14 April 2023. It 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. North is to the right. The ground resolution is approximately 21 m/pixel and the image is centred at about 231°E/84°N.
[Image description: A rectangular slice of tan-coloured terrain shows a number of features on Mars: a rippling swathe of sand dunes to the left; two notable banks cutting down through the middle of the frame; two steep, semi-circular cliffs in the right-most third of the frame; and smooth terrain to the right. There are signs of layered ground throughout the frame, and the steep cliffs cast dark shadows onto the ground below. A handful of these features are marked by labels placed across the frame.]
Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
After it's arrival at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana ahead of launch, the James Webb Space Telescope is unboxed inside a dedicated spacecraft preparation facility where it will be examined to ensure that it is undamaged from its voyage and in good working order.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - P.Piron
Check our accessible text here.
Image description: Spacecraft, landers and rovers on the Moon.
Over 50 spacecraft have successfully launched from Earth to fly past, orbit, impact and land on the Moon.
19 landers and 7 rovers have visited the lunar surface.
The European Space Agency’s next hardware to land on the Moon is on the Russian Luna-25 lander.
#ForwardToTheMoon
Credits: ESA