European Space Agency

Image: Can you spot it? View the full article

ESA’s mission to explore Jupiter and its largest moons has safely arrived at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, where final preparations for its April launch are now underway. The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer – better known as Juice – arrived on 8 February at Félix Eboué airport in Cayenne by a special Antonov Airlines An-124 cargo flight from Toulouse, France, where prime contractor Airbus completed a nearly decade-long process of concept, design, testing and construction. Now, the spacecraft will undergo final testing and inspection by engineers from ESA and Airbus before it is fueled up and mounted on its Ariane 5 rocket. View the full article

Image: Agricultural fields that surround the cities of Lund and Malmö in Sweden are pictured in this image, captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission. View the full article

Image: Sound test of Hera asteroid mission antenna View the full article

Video: 00:03:21 Three-minute cinematic video trailer presenting ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice) mission View the full article

During a break from looking at planets around other stars, ESA’s CHaracterising ExOPlanet Satellite (Cheops) mission has observed a dwarf planet in our own Solar System and made a decisive contribution to the discovery of a dense ring of material around it. The dwarf planet is known as Quaoar. The presence of a ring at a distance of almost seven and a half times the radius of Quaoar, opens up a mystery for astronomers to solve: why has this material not coalesced into a small moon? View the full article

Image: Deadly wildfires continue to rage in south-central Chile destroying hundreds of thousands of hectares of land across the country. Satellite images captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission on 4 February show the ongoing fires and heatwave in South America. View the full article

A previously unknown 100–200-metre asteroid — roughly the size of Rome’s Colosseum — has been detected by an international team of European astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. Their project used data from the calibration of the Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI), in which the team serendipitously detected an interloping asteroid. The object is likely the smallest observed to date by Webb and may be an example of an object measuring under 1 kilometer in length within the main asteroid belt, located between Mars and Jupiter. More observations are needed to better characterize this object’s nature and properties. View the full article

Video: 00:05:36 Five-minute behind-the-scenes documentary covering the story behind the application of the Galileo tribute plaque to ESA’s Juice spacecraft. View the full article

Week in images: 30 January - 03 February 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article

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Image: Kolkata, formerly Calcutta, is featured in this image, captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission. View the full article

Image: Exploring a turbulent tarantula View the full article

Euclid: exploring the dark Universe Euclid: exploring the dark Universe View the full article

ESA’s geology training course PANGAEA has come of age with the publication of a paper that describes the quest for designing the best possible geology training for the next astronauts to walk on the surface of the Moon. View the full article

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The 2023 Young Graduate Trainee positions are now open for applications! Opportunities are available in engineering, science, IT and business services. Find out more and apply now. View the full article

Image: Setting sail for safer space View the full article

Mars displays fascinating geology everywhere you look – and nowhere is this more true than in the fractured, wrinkled ground seen in this image from ESA’s Mars Express. View the full article

Image: A crowded field of galaxies throngs this Picture of the Month from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, along with bright stars crowned with Webb’s signature six-pointed diffraction spikes. The large spiral galaxy at the base of this image is accompanied by a profusion of smaller, more distant galaxies which range from fully-fledged spirals to mere bright smudges. Named LEDA 2046648, it is situated a little over a billion light-years from Earth, in the constellation Hercules. One of Webb’s principle science goals is to observe distant — and hence ancient — galaxies to understand the details of their formation, evolution, and composition. Webb’s keen infrared vision helps the telescope peer back in time, as the light from older, more distant galaxies is redshifted towards infrared wavelengths. Comparing these galactic fossils to modern galaxies will help astronomers understand how galaxies grew to form the structures we see in the universe today. Webb will also probe the chemical composition of thousands of galaxies to shed light on how heavy elements were formed and built up as galaxies evolved. To take full advantage of Webb’s potential for galaxy archeology, astronomers and engineers must first calibrate the telescope’s instruments and systems. Each of Webb’s instruments contains a labyrinthine array of mirrors and other optical elements that redirect and focus starlight gathered by Webb’s main mirror. This particular observation was part of the commissioning campaign for Webb’s Near-InfraRed Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS). As well as performing science in its own right, NIRISS supports parallel observations with Webb’s Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam). NIRCam captured this galaxy-studded image while NIRISS was observing the white dwarf WD1657+343, a well-studied star. This allows astronomers to interpret and compare data from the two different instruments, and to characterise the performance of NIRISS. [Image description: Many stars and galaxies lie on a dark background, in a variety of colours but mostly shades of orange. Some galaxies are large enough to make out spiral arms. Along the bottom of the frame is a large, detailed spiral galaxy seen at an oblique angle, with another galaxy about one-quarter the size just beneath it. Both have a brightly glowing core, and areas of star formation which light up their spiral arms.] View the full article

Video: 00:04:25 An iceberg around the size of Greater London broke off Antarctica’s Brunt Ice Shelf due to a natural process called ‘calving’. The iceberg, measuring 1550 sq km, detached from the 150 m-thick ice shelf a decade after scientists first spotted massive cracks in the shelf. For more information on the newly-birthed A81 iceberg, click here. View the full article

We’ve just made it easier to use the ESA brand to create merchandise or materials for events. If you are interested in producing and selling merchandising that shows the ESA logo, the ESA flags patch or ESA’s mission patches, there is now a simple way to request the use of ESA emblems. View the full article

Image: Tempestuous young stars in Orion View the full article

Video: 00:00:23 Using radar images from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission, the animation shows the A81 iceberg breaking away from the Brunt Ice Shelf on 25 January 2023. The new berg is estimated to be around 1550 sq km, which is around the size of Greater London, and is approximately 150 m thick. It calved when the crack known as Chasm-1 split northwards severing the west part of the ice shelf. The white square indicated the final breakpoint near the McDonald Ice Rumples. Routine monitoring from satellites offers unparalleled views of events happening in remote regions. The Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission carries radar, which can return images regardless of day or night and this allows us year-round viewing, which is especially important through the long, dark, austral winter months. Read the full story: Giant iceberg breaks away from Antarctic ice shelf View the full article

An ambitious new development phase of ESA’s 5G/6G Hub has begun. View the full article