Space News & Blog Articles

ESA’s Optical Ground Station, perched high on the slopes of Tenerife’s Mount Teide volcano, has now been peering skyward for a quarter of a century. Originally designed for laser-based communications with satellites, it is today additionally employed for tracking space debris and near-Earth asteroids as well as supporting world-class science: this year’s Physics Nobel Prize winner used the station for a quantum teleportation experiment that extended to the neighboring island of La Palma.

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Short animation featuring key moments of the Mars Sample Return campaign: from landing on Mars and securing the sample tubes to launching them off the surface and ferrying them back to Earth.

Shipping is the most energy efficient form of transport, and more than 80% of goods traded globally are carried via the oceans, with a doubling in volume during the last quarter of a century. Recognising the global need for seamless maritime navigation, ESA’s Navigation Innovation and Support Programme, NAVISP – inventing the future of navigation with more than 200 R&D projects initiated to date – is therefore focused not only on the land but also the sea.

Astronomy is driven by big questions, and they don’t come much bigger than wondering how the first stars and galaxies began to form – eventually giving rise to our own existence.

World leaders, policymakers and delegates from nearly 200 countries have convened in Sharm El-Sheikh over the past two weeks at the COP27 UN Climate Summit. Today we take a closer look at the Egyptian city through the eyes of Copernicus Sentinel-2.

ESA’s Investor Network continues to grow, with Einstein Industries Ventures as its latest member via the signature of a collaboration agreement.

An advanced X-ray monitoring instrument tested for space aboard an ESA CubeSat will serve as an operational space weather payload on the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Next Lagrange 1 Series satellite, currently planned for launch in 2028, which will operate 1.5 million km from Earth, keeping watch for eruptions from our Sun.

In October 2022, an updated ESA astronaut patch celebrated the joining of ESA’s newest Associate Member, Slovakia. The new patch adds the Slovakian flag to a design that has evolved over the decades to represent ESA’s growing space family.

The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has revealed the once-hidden features of the protostar within the dark cloud L1527 with its Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam), providing insight into the formation of a new star. These blazing clouds within the Taurus star-forming region are only visible in infrared light, making it an ideal target for Webb.

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Space is delivering more accurate, more precise and more varied data than ever before. State-of-the-art digital technologies, such as Digital Twins of Earth and High Performance Computing, are enabling faster and more complex calculations, allowing us to replicate the Earth system, its climate and life on our planet.

As part of worldwide efforts to slow climate change, the United Nations has revealed a new satellite-based system to detect methane emissions. The Methane Alert and Response System (MARS) initiative, launched at COP27, will scale up global efforts to detect and act on major emissions sources and accelerate the implementation of the Global Methane Pledge.

Image: Antenna to link up CubeSat chains

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The Space Launch System (SLS) rocket with the Orion spacecraft aboard lifted off at 07:47 CET from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA on 16 September 2022.

ESA has created a space-inspired virtual environment to enable its workforce to experience the COP27 climate summit – which is being held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt – without the environmental cost of travelling.

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‘Twas the day before launch and all across the globe, people await liftoff for Artemis I with hope.

Europe’s bid to deliver a return-to-Earth service for in-orbit transportation and research projects is rapidly taking shape, with teams working on the Space Rider spacecraft gearing up for a series of drop tests in 2023. Drop tests with small-scale models will be followed by a full-scale test in anticipation of inaugural flight towards the end of 2024. 

ESA’s Mars Express has revealed that Mars churns up surprisingly Earth-like cloud patterns that are reminiscent of those in our planet’s tropical regions.

Image: ESA Extremes

Europe should demonstrate responsibility, leadership and autonomy in space – and its highest priority should be to address climate change, according to a poll of European citizens.

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Galileo is Europe’s largest satellite constellation – and the world’s most accurate satnav system. The work on Galileo began two decades ago with two test GIOVE satellites, followed by a series of operational launches.