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License: Public Domain Dedication (CC0)
Source: Unsplash
Learn more about the Milky Way and Space Science on Wikipedia.
Orion is NASA’s next spacecraft to send humans into space. It is designed to send astronauts farther into space than ever before, beyond the Moon to asteroids and even Mars.
ESA has designed and is overseeing the development of Orion’s service module, the part of the spacecraft that supplies air, electricity 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.
The Orion spacecraft is built by NASA with ESA providing the service module. The arrangement stems from the international partnership for the International Space Station. NASA’s decision to cooperate with ESA on a critical element for the mission is a strong sign of trust and confidence in ESA’s capabilities.
More than 20 companies around Europe are now building the European Service Module as NASA works on Orion and the Space Launch System.
Learn more about Orion and Europe’s involvement here. Follow the latest updates via the Orion blog.
Credits: ESA–K. Oldenburg
The 73rd International Astronautical Congress (IAC 2022), taking place from 18 to 22 September at the Paris Convention Centre in Paris, France. A week of lively interactions awaits the world space community, this year under the theme 'Space for @ll'. The congress will open its doors to the general public on 21 September.
Credits: ESA - P. Sebirot
Key messages about ESA’s Solar Orbiter mission.
Solar Orbiter is a space mission of international collaboration between ESA and NASA. Its mission is to perform unprecedented close-up observations of the Sun and from high-latitudes, providing the first images of the uncharted polar regions of the Sun, and investigating the Sun-Earth connection. Data from the spacecraft’s suite of ten instruments will provide unprecedented insight into how our parent star works in terms of the 11-year solar cycle, and how we can better predict periods of stormy space weather.
Credits: ESA-S.Poletti
Pangaea-X is a test campaign that brings together geology, high-tech survey equipment and space exploration. Astronauts, scientists, operations experts and instrumentation engineers work side-by-side to advance European know-how of integrated human and robotics mission operations.
An extension of ESA’s Pangaea geology training, the training involves working with the latest technologies in instrumentation, navigation, remote sensing, 3D imaging and geoscience equipment.
The Pangaea-X crew explores the barren and dry landscape of Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, Spain, to prepare for the day when we set foot on other worlds. Known as the island of a thousand volcanoes, Lanzarote was chosen because of its geological similarity with Mars, such as a volcanic origin, mild sedimentary processes owing to a dry climate, hardly any vegetation and a well-preserved landscape.
Credits: ESA–A. Romeo
Sentinel-1D has been transported from the cleanroom in Cannes, France, via Turin, Italy, all the way to French Guiana. The launch campaign is now underway to prepare the satellite for liftoff on an Ariane 6 rocket at the end of 2025.
The fourth satellite of the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission will continue the critical task of delivering key radar imagery of Earth’s surface for a wide range of Copernicus services and scientific applications.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG–C. Gallo
ESA has been dedicated to observing Earth from space ever since the launch of its first Meteosat weather satellite back in 1977. With the launch of a range of different types of satellites over the last 40 years, we are better placed to understand the complexities of our planet, particularly with respect to global change. Today’s satellites are used to forecast the weather, answer important Earth-science questions, provide essential information to improve agricultural practices, maritime safety, help when disaster strikes, and all manner of everyday applications. The need for information from satellites is growing at an ever-increasing rate. With ESA as world-leader in Earth observation, the Agency remains dedicated to developing cutting-edge spaceborne technology to further understand the planet, improve daily lives and support effect policy-making for a more sustainable future.
Credits: ESA
Use red-blue stereo ‘3D’ glasses to best enjoy this view of dust dunes cascading over the edge of Green Crater, in the Noachis Terra region of Mars.
Dunes on Mars are dynamic features, observed to move at speeds of up to 5 m per martian year. Dust devil streaks –blue in this colour-composite representation – are seen on the interior wall of the crater. The different colours indicate the range of surface composition both inside and outside the crater.
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 10 December 2018. The image is aligned from left to right along the ground-track of the spacecraft. It is centred at 59.92ºS/351.66ºE and measures about 7 km on the short side.
Credits: ESA/Roscosmos/CaSSIS, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
ESA astronauts Alexander Gerst, Matthias Maurer, Samantha Cristoforetti and Thomas Pesquet completed a helicopter training course with the German Bundeswehr, Germany's federal defence forces. They participated in a three-week training programme at the International Helicopter Training Centre in Bückeburg, Germany. The course included one week of simulator instruction followed by two weeks of practical flying in EC135 helicopters, with operations conducted over central Germany and in mountainous terrain in the German Alps.
Helicopter training offers a realistic analogue for the dynamics of planetary landings, requiring capabilities such as vertical take-off and landing, terrain-based decision-making, and high levels of coordination and situational awareness. These skills are essential for future human spaceflight missions, including lunar landings, where astronauts will descend to the surface using a human landing system and later launch back to orbit. Helicopter manoeuvres closely mirror these mission phases, helping astronauts build proficiency in environments that demand precision and adaptability.
Alexander and Matthias began the course in mid-September, with Samantha and Thomas joining at the beginning of October. The group formally graduated from training on 17 October, marking a key milestone in Europe's preparations for future missions to the Moon and operations on the lunar surface.
Credits: Bundeswehr/J. Neumann
ESA project astronaut Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski uses one of ESA's space freezers during his stay on the International Space Station (ISS).
The European space freezers are called MELFI, acronym for Minus Eighty-Degree Laboratory Freezer for ISS. European astronauts use them to keep samples like urine, blood or saliva cold. Their temperature is typically set at around –90°C, so astronauts need gloves to operate them.
Follow Sławosz’s journey on the Ignis website, check our launch kit and connect with him on his Instagram and X accounts.
Credits: Tibor Kapu - HUNOR
Mars’s Medusae Fossae Formation (MFF) consists of a series of wind-sculpted deposits measuring hundreds of kilometres across and several kilometres high. Found at the boundary between Mars’s highlands and lowlands, the features are possibly the biggest single source of dust on Mars, and one of the most extensive deposits on the planet.
But this dry layer seems to hide a secret. A team of researchers used Mars Express radar data to peer below the surface. What they found was a top layer of dust that covers what seems to be a thick layer of deposits rich in water ice. This map shows the estimated amount of ice within the mounds that form the MFF, indicating that the ice-rich deposits are up to 3000 m thick.
The researchers estimate that the layer of dry material (likely dust or volcanic ash) covering the ice is 300–600 m thick. This map shows the ice thickness if we assume that the dust is 300 m thick. In this case, the total volume of water ice contained within the MFF deposits would be 400 000 km3, or if it melted, enough to cover Mars in an ocean of water 2.7 m deep.
If the dust layer is instead 600 m thick, the water ice layer would be thinner, and the total volume of water ice contained within the MFF deposits would be 220 000 km3, or if it melted, enough to cover Mars in an ocean of water 1.5 m deep.
[Image description: Grey planetary surface with coloured blobs. The blobs are blue around the outside, then go to green, yellow, orange, red then white towards the centre.]
Credits: Planetary Science Institute/Smithsonian Institution
ESA's Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) of the ESA–JAXA BepiColombo mission, sealed inside its shipping container, packed onboard the Antonov cargo plane that carried it from Amsterdam Schiphol airport to Kourou, French Guiana.
Credits: ESA–M.Cowan
ESA’s Hera asteroid mission for planetary defence seen with one of its two solar wings added, during its continuing test campaign at the ESTEC Test Centre in the Nethelands.
The van-sized spacecraft, left, is powered by a pair of solar array wings, made up of three panels each, provided by Beyond Gravity in Switzerland.
One of these 5-m-long wings was added for Hera’s ‘cold deployment check’ – a manual unfolding process to confirm that the wing fits correctly. Because the solar wings have been designed to operate in weightlessness they were supported by a frame during this test deployment.
Credits: ESA-SJM Photography
Unspecting the underside of one of the two Galileo satellites 23–24 as it is lifted within the Satellite Preparation Building of Europe's Spaceport. The satellite pair reached French Guiana on 4 May 2018.
Credits: ESA-CNES-Arianespace/Optique Video du CSG - JM Guillon
Teams in front of the Ariane 6 test model at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana.
Europe’s next rocket, Ariane 6, passed all its qualification tests in preparation for its first flight, and now the full-scale test model needs to be removed from the launch pad to make way for the real rocket that will ascend to space.
The test model that is now on the launch pad at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, stands 62 m high. It is exactly the same as the ‘production model’ Ariane 6 rockets that will soon be launched, except that its boosters do not need to be tested as part of the complete rocket, so the boosters are not fuelled.
To make way for launch, teams from ArianeGroup, France’s space agency CNES and ESA have started to remove the Ariane 6 test model by disconnecting the cables and fuel lines that pass through the launch tower.
On 30 January 2024, the cryogenic connection system passed a last system test of the liftoff disconnection operations lines. The yellow arms seen here support the fuel lines that deliver liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to the upper stage to power the Vinci orbital engine – for this test there was no propellant in the fuel lines. Simultaneously at the bottom of the central core the connection system for the main stage also disconnected.
The connection system allows the free-standing launcher a clear ascent corridor on its way to space, and protects the connection systems before the rocket engines’ plumes could damage it. The disconnection during the critical and complex dynamic liftoff phase must be executed in a strict timeline with an accuracy of a few milliseconds.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/ArianeGroup/Optique vidéo du CSG - P.Piron
Gravity affects everything we do on Earth but we know surprisingly little about how it works and how it affects life. Until recently scientists had no way of experimenting without gravity to understand what life would be like without it.
Research in space or with facilities on Earth that recreate aspects of space bring knowledge, discoveries and improvements to our daily life and further our exploration of the Solar System.
ESA offers many platforms for conducting experiments across the whole spectrum of scientific disciplines. You can run an experiment in a sounding rocket, drop towers, centrifuges, Antarctica and even the International Space Station.
Concordia research station in Antarctica sits on a plateau 3200 m above sea level. A place of extremes, temperatures can drop to –80°C in the winter, with a yearly average temperature of –50°C. Concordia crewmembers are generally not adapted to living at high altitude with little oxygen. Observing how their bodies adapt to the isolation and low pressure gives a good indication as to how astronauts will adapt to spaceflight far from Earth.
Proposals for experiments are always welcome and can be submitted via the research announcement page
Credits: ESA
Pangaea-X is a test campaign that brings together geology, high-tech survey equipment and space exploration. Astronauts, scientists, operations experts and instrumentation engineers work side-by-side to advance European know-how of integrated human and robotics mission operations.
An extension of ESA’s Pangaea geology training, the training involves working with the latest technologies in instrumentation, navigation, remote sensing, 3D imaging and geoscience equipment.
The Pangaea-X crew explores the barren and dry landscape of Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, Spain, to prepare for the day when we set foot on other worlds. Known as the island of a thousand volcanoes, Lanzarote was chosen because of its geological similarity with Mars, such as a volcanic origin, mild sedimentary processes owing to a dry climate, hardly any vegetation and a well-preserved landscape.
Credits: ESA–A. Romeo
NASA Apollo astronaut Al Worden, in conversation with Charlie Duke, Walt Cunningham, 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
The two candidates for the landing site of the ESA-Roscosmos rover and surface science platform. The study area of each landing site is indicated by the black outline; the shape corresponds to the different landing ellipses defined by factors such as different launch dates within the launch window and, in the case of Mawrth Vallis, local topography constraints resulting in different landing ellipse centres depending on the launch date.
The map is colour-coded corresponding to elevation: whites and reds are higher than yellows and greens. The data was obtained by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter onboard NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor.
Both landing site candidates lie close to the transition between the cratered northern highlands and the southern lowlands of Mars. They lie just north of the equator, in a region with many channels cutting through from the southern highlands to the northern lowlands. As such, they preserve a rich record of geological history from the planet’s wetter past, billions of years ago.
Credits: NASA/JPL
ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano's Beyond mission logo.
In selecting Beyond, Luca was inspired by his fellow ESA astronauts. From the nearness to Earth of Thomas Pesquet’s Proxima mission to the broadening scope of Alexander Gerst’s current Horizons mission, Luca saw a path that will push humankind even farther, for the benefit of all.
“What we do in orbit is not just for the astronauts or for the International Space Station programme, it is for everybody,” Luca explains. “It is for Earth, it is for humankind, and it is the only path for us to learn what we need in terms of science and technology in order to go beyond.”
The mission logo illustrates this trajectory. An astronaut looks out into space through a helmet visor. Earth and the Space International Station are reflected in this visor. In the distance, the Moon is poised for humankind’s return, with the Orion spacecraft and exploratory rovers. Beyond is Mars, the Red Planet, currently being studied by satellites such as ExoMars, Mars Express and, one day, by humans.
Credits: ESA
ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano announced the name of his second mission and logo during an event at ESA’s ESRIN establishment in Italy on 27 September 2018. Luca will be going ‘Beyond’ when he returns to the International Space Station in 2019 as part of Expedition 60/61, alongside Andrew Morgan of NASA and Alexander Skvortsov of Roscosmos.
The event coincided with Luca’s birthday and the anniversary of 50 years of ESRIN, ESA’s centre for Earth observation in Frascati, near Rome. ESRIN is one of the agency’s main specialised centres in Europe, and its founding ceremony took place on 27 September 1968.
Luca was the first of the 2009 astronaut class to fly to the Space Station. His first mission Volare, meaning 'to fly' in Italian, took place in 2013 and lasted 166 days, during which time Luca conducted two spacewalks and many experiments that are still running today.
Credits: ESA - M. Valentini
Mars Express has provided a wealth of evidence for the planet’s wetter past, from images of dried out river beds to the discovery of minerals that can only form in the presence of water. With radar, the spacecraft also detected a pond of liquid water buried below layers of ice near the planet’s south pole. Meanwhile, the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter is mapping the distribution of water-ice and water-rich minerals in the uppermost metre of the planet’s surface. Understanding critical resources like water is essential to understand the history of life on other worlds – and for future robotic and human exploration.
ESA has demonstrated expertise in studying Mars from orbit, now we are looking to secure a safe landing, to rove across the surface and to drill underground to search for evidence of life. Our orbiters are already in place to provide data relay services for surface missions. The next logical step is to bring samples back to Earth, to provide access to Mars for scientists globally, and to better prepare for future human exploration of the Red Planet.
This set of infographics highlight’s ESA’s contribution to Mars exploration as we ramp up to the launch of our second ExoMars mission, and look beyond to completing a Mars Sample Return mission.
Credits: ESA – S. Poletti
Quasar J0742+2704 (center) became the subject of astronomers’ interest after it was discovered to have a newborn jet blasting from the disk around its supermassive black hole in 2020, using the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) radio observatory. This led to follow-up with other observatories in an effort to determine the properties of the galaxy and what may have triggered the jet.
While the jet itself cannot be seen in this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope infrared-light image, the spiral shape of J0742+2704 is clear, with faint but detectable arms branching above and below the galaxy center. This was a big surprise to the research team, as quasars hosting jets are typically elliptical-shaped, and it is suspected that messy mergers with other galaxies are what funnel gas toward the black hole and fuel jets. These mergers would also disrupt any spiral formation a galaxy may have had before mixing its contents with another galaxy.
Though its intact spiral shape means it has not experienced a major merger, Hubble does show evidence that its lower arm has been disrupted, possibly by the tidal forces of interaction with another galaxy. This could mean that jets can be triggered by a far less involved, dramatic interaction of galaxies than a full merger. The large galaxy to the lower right of the quasar appears to be a ring galaxy, another sign of interaction. Ring galaxies form after a small galaxy passes through the center of a larger galaxy, reconfiguring its gas and dust.
The brightest parts of this image — foreground stars and the bright center of the quasar — show the characteristic “starry” spikes produced by Hubble (and other telescopes’) interior structure. They are not actual aspects of the cosmic objects
[Image description: Field of yellow galaxies of various sizes and distances on a black background. Two larger galaxies are prominent. Centered is a galaxy with a bright core and faint spiral arms coming off its top and bottom. To the lower right of the spiral is a ring galaxy with an apparent gap between its bright core and the ring oval of dust and gas surrounding it.]
Credits: NASA, ESA, K. Nyland (United States Naval Research Laboratory), J. DePasquale (STScI); CC BY 4.0
In the Space Pavilion at the Berlin Air and Space Show, a joint exhibition of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy (BMWi), the German Aerospace Center (DLR), the European Space Agency (ESA) and the German Aerospace Industries Association (BDLI), 28 and 29 April 2018.
Credits: ESA–Manuel Pedoussaut, 2018
ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano waves from the bus that will transport him and his crewmates from the Cosmonaut Hotel to Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Luca, NASA astronaut Drew Morgan and Roscosmos cosmonaut and Soyuz commander Alexander Skvortsov will be launched in their Soyuz MS-13 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Saturday 20 July. This date coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing and marks the start of Luca’s second space mission known as ‘Beyond’.
While in orbit, Luca will support over 50 European experiments and more than 200 international experiments. He is also expected to perform a number of spacewalks to repair the cooling systems of dark matter hunter, AMS-02.
More information about Luca’s Beyond mission is available on the blog. This will be updated throughout his mission, with updates also shared on Twitter via @esaspaceflight.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
Following Sentinel-1C encapsulation inside the Vega-C rocket fairing, the team at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou has signed the sticker on the rocket as per tradition.
Scheduled to lift off on 5 December 2024, Sentinel-1C is the third Sentinel-1 satellite to be launched as part of Europe’s Copernicus programme. It will continue the critical task of delivering radar imagery for a wide range of services, applications and science – all of which benefit society.
Credits: ESA-CNES-ARIANESPACE/Optique vidéo du CSG-P.Piperot
The 11th annual ESA Open Day at ESA’s technical centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, took place on the weekend of 1 and 2 October 2022. On 1 October, visitors with disabilities had the opportunity to follow the tour at their own pace. On both days visitors were able to meet astronauts, space scientists and engineers and learn all about the work carried out at Europe’s largest space establishment.
Credits: G. Porter
The High Resolution Stereo Camera on board ESA’s Mars Express snapped a view of a curious cloud formation that appears regularly in the vicinity of the Arsia Mons volcano.
This water ice cloud, which arises as the volcano slope interacts with the air flow, can be seen as the long white feature extending to the lower right of the volcano. The cloud, which measures 915 km in this view, also casts a shadow on the surface. This image was taken on 21 September 2018 from an altitude of about 6930 km. North is up.
More information: Mars Express keeps an eye on curious cloud.
Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Concordia research station in Antarctica is located on a plateau 3200 m above sea level. A place of extremes, temperatures can drop to –80°C in the winter, with a yearly average temperature of –50°C.
As Concordia lies at the very southern tip of Earth, the Sun does not rise above the horizon in the winter and does not set in the summer. The crew must live without sunlight for four months of the year.
The station is a collaboration between the French Institut Polaire Français Paul-Emile Victor (IPEV) and Italian Programma Nazionale di Richerche Antartide (PNRA).
Credits: ESA/IPEV/PNRA–C. Possnig
Mysterious and enigmatic: the exhaust plume of Ariane 5 V213 disappears into dark and cloudy French Guiana sky on 5 June 2013, as it carries ESA’s fourth Automated Transfer Vehicle, ATV Albert Einstein, to the International Space Station.
Credits: ESA/S.Corvaja
The BepiColombo mission logo sticker is added to the fairing of the Ariane 5 launcher that will lift the spacecraft into orbit.
BepiColombo is a joint endeavour between ESA and JAXA. It is the first European mission to Mercury, the smallest and least explored planet in the inner Solar System, and the first to send two spacecraft to make complementary measurements of the planet’s dynamic environment at the same time.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique video du CSG – P.Baudon
The 11th annual ESA Open Day at ESA’s technical centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, took place on the weekend of 1 and 2 October 2022. On 1 October, visitors with disabilities had the opportunity to follow the tour at their own pace. On both days visitors were able to meet astronauts, space scientists and engineers and learn all about the work carried out at Europe’s largest space establishment.
Credits: G. Porter
Europa 2 space rocketsharetwitter
© #About_Pixels / #museum #ESC #spacescience / #SpaceEploration at #Euro Space Center in #Transinne
Great news for two members of ESA’s newest class of astronauts: Sophie Adenot and Raphaël Liégeois are officially assigned to their first missions to the International Space Station (ISS).
Big smiles and happy faces lit up the venue in Brussels as the ESA Director General announced the first two astronaut missions for the new ESA astronaut class of 2022 on 22 May, the opening day of the Space Council.
Right now, Sophie and Raphaël are at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, USA, for their pre-assignment training. They are set to fly in 2026, potentially meeting for a few days in space, with Sophie aiming for a flight in spring and Raphaël in autumn.
But before they can fly to space, the new ESA astronauts are entering a pre-assignment training where they build on what they’ve learned. They will get more hands-on experience with Space Station modules and systems and learn how to perform scientific experiments in ESA’s Columbus laboratory. This training is conducted with international astronaut classes at all partner sites.
Once their missions and crew are confirmed, Sophie and Raphaël will transition to assigned crew training, focusing on specific mission goals and training closely with their assigned ISS crewmembers.
Sophie, from France, and Raphaël, from Belgium, were selected during the last ESA astronaut selection in 2022 from over 22 500 applicants from ESA Member States, alongside fellow ESA astronauts Pablo Álvarez Fernández from Spain, Rosemary Coogan from the UK and Marco Sieber from Switzerland.
In total, 17 individuals were chosen for the astronaut class of 2022, including 12 members of the ESA astronaut reserve and the five astronaut candidates, who began their basic training at ESA's European Astronaut Centre in Germany in April 2023.
The 2022 class of ESA astronauts, called The Hoppers, completed an intensive one-year programme covering spacecraft systems, spacewalking, flight engineering, robotics, life support systems, survival, and medical training. They officially graduated as ESA astronauts on 22 April 2024, making them eligible for spaceflight.
Once on the International Space Station, ESA astronauts will conduct science and medical research, Earth observation, outreach activities, as well as maintenance and operational tasks. All five new European astronauts will be assigned to missions to the Space Station by 2030 to carry out scientific experiments, many of which come from Europe.
The next European adventure starts off with our French-Belgian duo, Sophie and Raphaël.
Credits: ESA - M. Cowan
Orion is NASA’s next spacecraft to send humans into space. It is designed to send astronauts farther into space than ever before, beyond the Moon to asteroids and even Mars.
ESA has designed and is overseeing the development of Orion’s service module, the part of the spacecraft that supplies air, electricity 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.
The Orion spacecraft is built by NASA with ESA providing the service module. The arrangement stems from the international partnership for the International Space Station. NASA’s decision to cooperate with ESA on a critical element for the mission is a strong sign of trust and confidence in ESA’s capabilities.
More than 20 companies around Europe are now building the European Service Module as NASA works on Orion and the Space Launch System.
Learn more about Orion and Europe’s involvement here. Follow the latest updates via the Orion blog.
Credits: ESA–K. Oldenburg
The Cheops (CHaracterising ExOPlanet) spacecraft in the Large European Acoustic Facility (LEAF) test chamber at
ESA's European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, on 7 September, 2018.
The Cheops spacecraft is currently undergoing a series of acoustic testing.
Cheops will observe bright stars known to host exoplanets, in particular Earth-to-Neptune-sized planets, anywhere in the sky. It will study the dip in brightness of a star as a planet transits in front of it, allowing the size of these planets to be determined. Combined with mass measurements already calculated from other observatories, Cheops will enable the planet’s density to be determined, and thus make a first-step characterisation of the nature of these worlds.
Credits: ESA - G. Porter
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
This image was taken by the Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) onboard the ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter on 18 November 2018. Just above centre is a well-preserved 4 km-wide crater. This slice of Mars sits just to the northeast of largest well-preserved impact basin on Mars, Hellas, in the planet’s southern highlands.
The colour capability of CaSSIS reveals exposures of light-toned bedrock in this colour-composite view. The light-toned bedrock, observed extensively throughout the region, may be associated with the formation of some of the most ancient rocks of the Hellas basin – between 3.7 and 4.1 billion years ago. Many exposures of this terrain show evidence of being altered chemically by water, with phyllosilicate clays being one of the most common minerals formed during this early period of martian history.
The image is centred at 28.36ºS/79.75ºE. North is up.
Credits: ESA/Roscosmos/CaSSIS, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Orion is NASA’s next spacecraft to send humans into space. It is designed to send astronauts farther into space than ever before, beyond the Moon to asteroids and even Mars.
ESA has designed and is overseeing the development of Orion’s service module, the part of the spacecraft that supplies air, electricity 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.
The Orion spacecraft is built by NASA with ESA providing the service module. The arrangement stems from the international partnership for the International Space Station. NASA’s decision to cooperate with ESA on a critical element for the mission is a strong sign of trust and confidence in ESA’s capabilities.
More than 20 companies around Europe are now building the European Service Module as NASA works on Orion and the Space Launch System.
Learn more about Orion and Europe’s involvement here. Follow the latest updates via the Orion blog.
Credits: ESA–K. Oldenburg
Neukum Crater in context of its surrounds in Noachis Terra. It is situated about 800 km from the western rim of Mars’ largest impact basin Hellas.
The region outlined by the large white boxes indicate the area imaged during Mars Express orbits 2529, 4346 and 4357, from which the associated image release, outlined by the smaller box, is compiled. In this context image, north is up.
Credit: NASA MGS MOLA Science Team
ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst during his last week of training at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, USA. Alexander reviewed the main tasks he has to perform during his mission. His training started two years ago and has moved from general maintenance classes to specific tasks related to the Horizons mission.
Among these tasks are work on the airlock, the replacement of umbilical equipment for Extra Vehicular Activities (EVAs), testing of tools, review of experiments, making repairs and checking the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module.
Alexander will be launched on 6 June with US astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Prokopyev from the Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakhstan in the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft. Soyuz MS-09 will be the 138th flight of a Soyuz spacecraft.
The mission is called Horizons to evoke exploring our Universe, looking far beyond our planet and broadening our knowledge. His first mission was called Blue Dot. Alexander will take over command of the International Space Station for the second half of his mission. This is only the second time that a European astronaut will take up this leading position on the space outpost – the first was ESA astronaut Frank De Winne in 2009. Alexander Gerst is the 11th German citizen to fly into space.
The science programme is packed with European research: more than 50 experiments will deliver benefits to people back on Earth and prepare for future space exploration.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
The 9th high-level EU/ESA Space Council, with the theme 'Space as an enabler', took place on Tuesday, 28 May, in the Lex Building of the European Commission in Brussels. Brussels. Ministers discussed European Space Policy, strengthening Europe's role as a global actor in the field of space, and highlighted how research and innovation are a driving force for a more competitive European Union.
Credits: European Union
Since 13 September 2018, the Visual Monitoring Camera (VMC) on board ESA’s Mars Express has been observing the evolution of a curious cloud formation that appears regularly in the vicinity of the 20 km-high Arsia Mons volcano, close to the planet’s equator. The cloud can be seen in this VMC image taken 10 October as the white, elongated feature extending 1500 km westward of the volcano.
Follow the development of this cloud via the daily images sent by the Visual Monitoring Camera on Mars Express
More information: Mars Express keeps an eye on curious cloud.
Credits: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Work is underway to complete the Ariane 6 launch complex at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana.
The mobile gantry is a 90 metre-high mobile metallic structure weighing 8200 tonnes when fully equipped, that rolls on rails equipped with platforms to access the appropriate launcher levels for integration on the launch pad. The gantry is moved away just before launch.
The two symmetric exhaust ducts of the launch pad are visible.
The Launcher Assembly Building, a structure 20 m tall, 112 m long and 41 m wide, is located 1 km away from the launch zone. It is used for launch vehicle horizontal integration/preparation before rollout to the launch zone.
The first Ariane 6 flight is scheduled for 2020.
Credits: ESA - S. Corvaja
A high-resolution image from the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) on ESA’s Solar Orbiter spacecraft, taken with the HRIEUV telescope on 30 May 2020. These images show the Sun’s appearance at a wavelength of 17 nanometers, which is in the extreme ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum. Images at this wavelength reveal the upper atmosphere of the Sun, the corona, with a temperature of around 1 million degrees.
On 30 May, Solar Orbiter was roughly halfway between the Earth and the Sun, meaning that it was closer to the Sun than any other solar telescope has ever been before.
Credits: Solar Orbiter/EUI Team (ESA & NASA); CSL, IAS, MPS, PMOD/WRC, ROB, UCL/MSSL
Gregor Reisch's Margarita philosophica, an encyclopedia intended for younger students, first appeared in Freiburg, Germany in 1503, the same year Reisch became the prior of the town's charterhouse. Divided into twelve chapters, all filled with charts, diagrams, and block prints, the work remained a popular text for many years. The section on astrology has a fine example of the "zodiac man." Each sign of the zodiac corresponds to a different part of the body. Zodiac men were very popular images which depicted the relationship between parts of the body and their celestial governors. The diagrams also served as reminders of how the microcosmos reflect the macrocosmos and the connection between earthly and celestial affairs. Zodiac men images were widely copied and reproduced and are still found today in almanacs. The second image depicts the astronomer Ptolemy or Claudius Ptolemaeus (second century AD), author of the Almagest, one of the most important treatises of mathematical astronomy of antiquity. Ptolemy holds to his eye a quadrant, an instrument for measuring in degrees the altitude of a celestial body (used for time reckoning). His crown is an unusual adornment because he was not a king or prince. Urania, the muse of astronomy, stands behind him, pointing to the heavens and directing his gaze. Near Ptolemy's feet, on the ground, is a discarded armillary sphere (for a description of this instrument, see: Sphaera mundi, 1490.) The third image on this page depicts Urania displaying the cosmos as visualized during the 16th century. The man in the center, Atlas, obscures the earth at the center of the concentric rings in a geocentric or earth-centered cosmos. Moving outward, each ring corresponds to a planet, beginning with the moon and ending with Saturn, the most distant planet visible to the naked eye (the next planet, Uranus, was not discovered until the 18th century). The ring after Saturn is the Firmament, the realm of the fixed stars (stars were not found to be in motion until the 18th century). Beyond the fixed stars are circles which represent the mechanism by which the planets appear to move, the crystalline spheres and the Prime Mover, and beyond is the realm of God and the angels. Atlas, the Titan in Greek mythology who is frequently depicted holding the earth on his shoulders, stands at the middle with a sheepish expression.
This year’s Open Day combined an in-person tour of ESTEC for visitors with disabilities on Saturday 2 October with an online event open to all the following afternoon.
The in-person event was formally opened by Head of ESTEC and ESA Director of Technology, Engineering and Quality Franco Ongaro, André Kuipers and former Dutch Minister for the Disabled Rick Brink.
With overall visitor numbers limited by continuing COVID-19 precautions, the aim was to give people with disabilities (and their carers) a special chance to see ESTEC – including those who might have found it impractical to visit the establishment amid the busy crowds of past Open Days.
Stands were set up by various ESA teams so that visitors could touch and hear, as well as see, space hardware and test equipment. Participants finished their tour with a question and answer session with André about his 204 days living and working in space.
Sunday’s online participants were greeted by ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher: “ESA is an Agency made of people, and this is your chance to meet many of those working behind the scenes.”
Highlights included a Q&A with German ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst, talks on future missions by ESA space scientists, presentations by ESA Education and Human Resources and a talk applying space recycling systems down to Earth – to convert pee into drinkable tea. The event encompassed multiple ESA establishments, including mission control centre ESOC in Germany, Earth observation centre ESRIN in Italy and space applications and telecommunications centre ESCAT in the UK.
Videos from Sunday’s virtual rooms will be available soon. For a full gallery of Saturday’s Open Day, click here.
Credits: ESA - SJM Photography
The first Ariane 6 that will be launched into space seen inside its mobile building at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana, 8 July 2024, the day before 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
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
An image of the Sun’s corona obtained with the Metis instrument on ESA’s Solar Orbiter. This was obtained on 21 June 2020, shortly after the spacecraft’s first perihelion, and was taken in visible light (580-640 nm). It shows the two bright equatorial streamers and fainter polar regions that are characteristic of the solar corona during times of minimal magnetic activity.
Credits: Solar Orbiter/Metis Team (ESA & NASA)