European Space Agency
The European Space Agency is an intergovernmental organization of 22 member states dedicated to the exploration of space. Established in 1975 and headquartered in Paris, ESA has a worldwide staff of about 2,200
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The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope recently trained its sights on weird and enigmatic Uranus, an ice giant that orbits on its side. What Webb found is a dynamic world with rings, moons, storms, and other atmospheric features – including a seasonal polar cap. The image expands upon a two-colour version released earlier this year, adding additional wavelength coverage for a more detailed look. View the full article
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Video: 00:08:22 2023’s highlight was the highly anticipated launch of Juice, Europe’s Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer. The Juice spacecraft was placed on course to Jupiter on the second-to-last Ariane 5 launch vehicle in April. After an eight-year journey, Juice will begin observing the giant gas planet and its three large ocean-bearing moons – Ganymede, Calisto and Europa. The Euclid space telescope was launched in July with the aim of unravelling the enigmas of ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy’. Euclid’s first images were released in November, revealing razor-sharp astronomical images with detail never before seen by a telescope across such a large patch of the sky. Aft…
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ESA is launching a competition which initiates a first phase of activities for European companies to eventually demonstrate a complete cargo delivery service to and from space stations in low-Earth orbit by 2028. View the full article
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Week in images: 11-15 December 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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Space is becoming ever more important to life on Earth – from managing climate change to responding to emergencies to digitalising the economy. To help policymakers and businesses take informed decisions about investing in space, ESA has today published plans to create robust and reliable data on the space economy, in collaboration with international partners. View the full article
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Image: As the holiday season swiftly approaches, frosty landscapes tend to be associated with the magical idea of a white Christmas. But this Copernicus Sentinel-3 image over the Antarctica Peninsula sheds light on a different perspective. View the full article
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Video: 01:00:00 ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and Swiss ESA Council Chair Renato Krpoun give an update on the roll-out of decisions taken at the Space Summit in Seville, including the implications for space transportation and progress towards enabling a European commercial provider to deliver supplies to the International Space Station by 2028 and return cargo to Earth. The evolution of the European Spaceport in Kourou is also covered. Furthermore, the briefing addresses upcoming, high-level political meetings on space and international cooperation projects that ESA runs with partners around the globe, as well as ESA’s contribution to Poland’s Earth obser…
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The second phase of the European Union’s Destination Earth initiative has been approved at ESA Council. Destination Earth, also known as DestinE, will build digital models of Earth allowing greater insight into weather and climate dynamics and their impacts on society. View the full article
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Two new senior staff have been appointed by ESA’s 22 Member States at today’s Council meeting. Laurent Jaffart will become the next Director of Connectivity and Secure Communications and Marco Ferrazzani will become the next Director of Internal Services. View the full article
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Discovery helps answer the question: How small can you go when forming stars? Brown dwarfs are sometimes called failed stars, since they form like stars through gravitational collapse, but never gain enough mass to ignite nuclear fusion. The smallest brown dwarfs can overlap in mass with giant planets. In a quest to find the smallest brown dwarf, astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have found the new record-holder: an object weighing just three to four times the mass of Jupiter. View the full article
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Milani needs you! This is your chance to design a mission patch for the Milani CubeSat which will fly with ESA's Hera planetary defence spacecraft to the Didymos binary asteroid system. View the full article
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Video: 00:01:25 Trailer of the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin mission. In 2028, ESA will launch its most ambitious exploration mission to search for past and present signs of life on Mars. Enjoy the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin mission in minute detail – everything down to the colour and size of the wires, sticky tape and scratches. The spacecraft, the rover and martian landscapes are as true to reality as possible for a simulation. The visuals show the spacecraft structural engineering with a faithful robotic appearance. The martian landscape has been simulated with meticulous realism. The story begins with the rover exploring the surface of the Red Planet. There is scie…
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ESA Highlights: the best of ESA in 2023 ESA Highlights is a visual showcase of some of ESA’s key achievements over a 12-month period. View the full article
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Video: 00:05:47 Ice is without doubt one of the first casualties of climate change, but the effects of our warming world are not only limited to ice melting on Earth’s surface. Ground that has been frozen for thousands of years, called permafrost, is thawing – adding to the climate crisis and causing serious issues for local communities. Scientists estimate that the world’s permafrost holds almost double the amount of carbon that is currently in the atmosphere. When permafrost warms and thaws, it releases methane and carbon dioxide, adding these greenhouse gases to the atmosphere and making global warming even worse. While permafrost cannot be directly observed fr…
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Video: 00:00:45 Live conversation between ESA astronaut and commander of the International Space Station (ISS) Andreas Mogensen and the 2023 Nobel Prize laureates Ferenc Krausz (in physics) and Moungi Bawendi (in chemistry). The event took place at the Nobel Prize Museum in Oslo which was connected to the ISS. Andreas showed a Nobel Prize he brought with him to the Space Station. View the full article
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The winning entry to a Europe-wide data visualisation contest was announced and showcased last week at COP28. The ‘Little Pictures’ competition challenged the continent’s creative talent to design compelling illustrations using the range of global observation records available from ESA, the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (Eumetsat) and European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), to highlight the key changes taking place across the climate. View the full article
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Like a shiny, round ornament ready to be placed in the perfect spot on the holiday tree, supernova remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A) gleams in a new image from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. However, this scene is no proverbial silent night – all is not calm. View the full article
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Week in images: 04-08 December 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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Image: The powerful Hurricane Otis has been captured in this Copernicus Sentinel-3 image when it was approaching Mexico’s southern Pacific coast in October 2023. View the full article
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Tropical forests are clearly critical to Earth’s climate system, but understanding exactly how much carbon they absorb from the atmosphere, store and release is tricky to calculate, not least because measuring and reporting methods vary. With these measurements paramount for nations assessing the action they are taking to combat the climate crisis, new research shows how differences in estimates of carbon flux associated with human activity can be reconciled. View the full article
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Video: 00:11:52 The Copernicus Anthropogenic Carbon Dioxide Monitoring (CO2M) mission will be the first satellite mission to measure how much carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere through human activity. CO2M isn't just a mission; it's a crucial step in our commitment to understanding and mitigating climate change. It will offer unprecedented precision in monitoring carbon dioxide emissions from the combustion of fossil fuel at national and regional scales. Its data will provide the EU with a unique and independent source of information to assess the effectiveness of policy measures and to track their impact towards decarbonising Europe ahead of the next …
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As the planet warms, many parts of the Earth system are undergoing large-scale changes. Ice sheets are shrinking, sea levels are rising and coral reefs are dying off. While climate records are being continuously broken, the cumulative impact of these changes could also cause fundamental parts of the Earth system to change dramatically. These ‘tipping points’ of climate change are critical thresholds in that, if exceeded, can lead to irreversible consequences. View the full article
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