European Space Agency

Image: GIF zooming in on globular star cluster View the full article

ESA has been presented the ‘Space for Climate Protection’ Special Award by the International Astronautical Federation during the Global Space Conference on Climate Change – currently taking place in Oslo, Norway. View the full article

Lying in bed for a full 60 days – with one shoulder always touching the mattress – might sound like bliss, but add cycling, spinning and constant medical tests to the equation and it becomes a challenging experience for the sake of human space exploration. View the full article

Video: 00:01:20 Satellites play a vital role in monitoring the rapid changes taking place in the Arctic. Tracking ice lost from the world’s glaciers, ice sheets and frozen land shows that Earth is losing ice at an accelerating rate. Using information from ESA’s ERS, Envisat and CryoSat satellites as well as the Copernicus Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 missions, research led by Tom Slater of the University of Leeds, found that the rate at which Earth has lost ice has increased markedly within the past three decades. Currently, more than a trillion tonnes of ice is lost each year. To put this into perspective, this is equivalent to an ice cube measuring 10x10x10 km over Oslo’s skyline. Putting it another way, the amount of ice loss globally is equivalent to 12 000 times the annual water use of the Norwegian capital. The sooner Earth’s temperature is stabilised, the more manageable the impacts of ice loss will be. Continuity in satellite data is the key to predicting future ice losses, and to assist in mitigating the threats posed by sea-level rise, shrinking high mountain glaciers and further climate feedbacks. The Copernicus Expansion missions, CRISTAL, CIMR and ROSE-L have been designed to fill the gaps in current Sentinel capabilities for comprehensive monitoring of changes in the global ice cover. View the full article

The first instrument to directly measure gravity on the surface of an asteroid has undergone testing in ESA’s Mechanical Systems Laboratory. View the full article

Video: 00:03:54 The name of Andreas’s second mission to the Space Station is ‘Huginn’. Inspired by Norse mythology, the name is taken from one of two ravens who serve the god Odin. Called Huginn and Muninn, these two birds sit on Odin’s shoulders and are sent flying across the world at dawn. They return at night to inform him of the many events they have seen and heard. In Old Norse, ‘Huginn’ means ‘thought’ and ‘Muninn’ means ‘mind’ or ‘memory’. ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen is going on his first long-duration mission to the International Space Station. Andreas will be the pilot on the SpaceX Crew Dragon that will carry him and the rest of Crew-7 to the Space Station – a first for a European! Representing Europe in space, Andreas will carry out science throughout his mission and bring back the knowledge to Earth, for the benefit of humankind. Visit esa.int/huginn for more information on the Huginn mission. View the full article

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ESA Astronaut Andreas Mogensen will fly to the International Space Station for his second mission called Huginn, in late summer of 2023. It will be a mission of firsts for both Andreas and ESA. View the full article

An advanced broadband satellite that will demonstrate next-generation 5G connectivity by providing high-speed internet services has launched into space. View the full article

Image: The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over Oslo, Norway’s capital and largest city, and host of the 2023 Global Space Conference on Climate Change, taking place on 23–25 May. View the full article

Adding to the grim list of record ice losses, record air temperatures and record droughts, which have all hit the headlines recently, the temperature of the surface waters of our oceans is also at an all-time high. With an El Niño looming, concerns are that we will soon be facing even worse extremes. Satellites orbiting overhead are being used to carefully track the patterns that lead up to El Niño to further understand and predict the consequences of this cyclic phenomenon against the backdrop of climate change. View the full article

Image: Origami heat shield: reusable for reentries View the full article

Euclid launch kit Interactive infographics and background information to prepare for Euclid’s launch View the full article

The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has enabled another long-sought scientific breakthrough, this time for Solar System scientists studying the origins of the water that has made life on Earth possible. Using Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) instrument, astronomers have confirmed gas – specifically water vapour – around a comet in the main asteroid belt for the first time, proving that water from the primordial Solar System can be preserved as ice in that region. However, the successful detection of water comes with a new puzzle: unlike other comets, Comet 238P/Read had no detectable carbon dioxide. View the full article

More than three weeks after efforts began to deploy Juice’s ice-penetrating Radar for Icy Moons Exploration (RIME) antenna, the 16-metre-long boom has finally escaped its mounting bracket. View the full article

Last month, ESA’s woolly astronaut became Europe's first lunar ‘lamb-bassador’: Shaun the Sheep returned home from his Artemis I mission to a hero's welcome and then was herded off on a celebratory post-flight tour. View the full article

Week in images: 08-12 May 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article

Image: This Copernicus Sentinel-2 image features the Japanese island of Nishinoshima, in the northwest Pacific Ocean. View the full article

Mars has some of the most impressive volcanoes in the Solar System. ESA’s Mars Express has now imaged the pitted, fissured flank of the planet’s second-tallest: Ascraeus Mons. View the full article

Astronomers used the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope to image the warm dust around a nearby young star, Fomalhaut, in order to study the first asteroid belt ever seen outside of our Solar System in infrared light. But to their surprise, they found that the dusty structures are much more complex than the asteroid and Kuiper dust belts of our Solar System. View the full article

Help us visualise how much of the Universe we know and don’t know and win a trip to mission control as ESA’s Euclid mission launches into space no earlier than July to unlock the mysteries of the Dark Universe. View the full article

ESA’s wind mission, Aeolus, will soon be lowered in orbit leading to its fiery reentry and burn-up through Earth’s atmosphere. ESA’s efforts to ensure a safe return go well beyond international standards and place the Agency in the lead for space safety. View the full article

Millions of supporters avidly follow football clubs across Europe, from Manchester United to Bayern Munich. Now ESA is partnering with UEFA to use space to help ensure the safety of football fans and the sustainability of the sport – as well as exploring other ways in which space can help promote football. View the full article

Week in images: 01-05 May 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article

Image: The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over El Oued, in northeast Algeria, about 80 km west of the border with Tunisia. View the full article