European Space Agency

European leaders will reaffirm plans to launch Europe on a world-leading trajectory during a high-level space summit to be held on 16 February in Toulouse, France. View the full article

Video: 00:01:36 You’ve heard of spacewalking astronauts but how do astronauts run? Join ESA’s Matthias Maurer for a workout on the International Space Station’s T2 treadmill and explore Node 3 in 360°. Astronauts living and working on the International Space Station exercise for around two hours a day six days a week to stay fit and healthy in orbit. This helps counteract muscle and bone loss caused by life in microgravity. The T2 treadmill is attached to the wall in Node 3 and astronauts secure themselves using a harness and bungies. This creates a feeling like running on a treadmill on Earth. This clip is just a snapshot of the exercise Matthias performs in space. A typical T2 session is around 30-40 minutes in length. Matthias was launched to the International Space Station for his current Cosmic Kiss mission on 11 November 2021. In his approximately six months on board, he will support over 35 European experiments and many more international experiments in orbit. For more on Matthias and his mission, visit the Cosmic Kiss mission page. Access the other Cosmic Kiss 360º videos View the full article

Week in images: 17 - 21 January 2022 Discover our week through the lens View the full article

Image: The first-of-its-kind complement of instruments dubbed the ‘space storm hunter’ hangs out in its new location outside the International Space Station in this image taken by on of the Station’s external cameras. The Atmosphere–Space Interactions Monitor, or ASIM for short, measures electric events in Earth’s upper atmosphere with cameras, photometers and X- and gamma-ray detectors. Last week ASIM was switched off and moved by robotic arm to another spot outside the Columbus module to make room for an American payload. Now in its new location, the instrument is being activated and so far things are going well. From its new vantage point, just next to its current one, ASIM is pointing in a different direction, slightly more towards the horizon instead of straight down. This will help researchers work out how much the atmosphere at different altitudes influences the processes of electrical discharges. It’s like viewing a firework display: one can enjoy the shapes more from the side than if one is just below the display! Though designed to look for electrical discharges born in stormy weather conditions in Earth’s upper atmosphere, ASIM recently detected a unique gamma-ray burst from outer space. The spurt turned out to be from an explosive giant flare from a magnetar located 10 million light-years away in a distant galaxy. Magnetars are a special type of neutron star – the collapsed core of what was once a supergiant star. This fortuitous observation was published in the December issue of Nature magazine. ASIM was built by Danish company Terma, the Danish Technical University, the University of Bergen in Norway and the University of Valencia in Spain for the European Space Agency. View the full article

The central core of ESA’s new generation Ariane 6 launch vehicle arrived at Europe’s Spaceport on 18 January and is now inside the launch vehicle assembly building. View the full article

Video: 01:00:30 Watch the replay of ‘Live from Space: The Next Frontier for Knowledge and Action’. ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer, live from the from the International Space Station discussed with a panel of prominent experts and industry leaders, including ESA’s Director General Josef Aschbacher, about how space research can improve life on our planet. View the full article

Part of Mecklenburg–West Pomerania, also known as Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, a state in northeast Germany is featured in this image captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission. A portion of the northwest coast of Poland can be seen in the right of the image. View the full article

Image: Sulphur dioxide from Tonga eruption spreads over Australia View the full article

The call for 2022 Young Graduate Trainee opportunities is nearly open! Get ready to apply and prepare your CVs and cover letters ahead of schedule! Find out more about this year's call for applications below. View the full article

In July 2017, a giant iceberg, named A-68, snapped off Antarctica’s Larsen-C ice shelf and began an epic journey across the Southern Ocean. Three and a half years later, the main part of iceberg, A-68A, drifted worryingly close to South Georgia. Concerns were that the berg would run aground in the shallow waters offshore. This would not only cause damage to the seafloor ecosystem but also make it difficult for island wildlife, such as penguins, to make their way to the sea to feed. Using measurements from satellites, scientists have charted how A-68A shrunk towards the end of its voyage, which fortunately prevented it from getting stuck. However, the downside is that it released a colossal 152 billion tonnes of freshwater close to the island, potentially having a profound effect on the island’s marine life. View the full article

In July 2017, a giant iceberg, named A-68, snapped off Antarctica’s Larsen-C ice shelf and began an epic journey across the Southern Ocean. Three and a half years later, the main part of iceberg, A-68A, drifted worryingly close to South Georgia. Concerns were that the berg would run aground in the shallow waters offshore. This would not only cause damage to the seafloor ecosystem but also make it difficult for island wildlife, such as penguins, to make their way to the sea to feed. Using measurements from satellites, scientists have charted how A-68A shrunk towards the end of its voyage, which fortunately prevented it from getting stuck. However, the downside is that it released a colossal 152 billion tonnes of freshwater close to the island, potentially having a profound effect on the island’s marine life. View the full article

Join ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer on Thursday, 20 January, in a live call from the International Space Station, from 14:00 GMT/15:00 CET, talking with prominent experts and industry leaders, to explore how space research can improve life on our planet. View the full article

Image: Crash test dummy View the full article

It took a crop of potatoes to keep Matt Damon alive on the red planet in The Martian. And in future, real life astronauts on the Moon and Mars will have to be gardeners, farmers and expert recyclers as well as explorers. Do you have promising ideas that might help them to get by in space on next to no resources? View the full article

The central core of ESA’s new generation Ariane 6 launch vehicle has arrived in French Guiana from Europe. This enables combined tests at Europe’s Spaceport where Ariane 6 parts will come together on the launch pad for the first time. View the full article

Video: 01:47:29 Exciting launches to the Moon and to the Red Planet, a second mission to the International Space Station for ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, the very first images provided by the James Webb Space Telescope, and a new class of European astronauts: 2022 looks very promising for European space! Watch the replay of our annual press conference with ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher presenting the highlights for 2022. He is joined by ESA Directors and answers questions from journalists. Access the Director General's slides View the full article

The next stage of ESA’s astronaut selection is underway, with around 1391 applicants invited to a full day of testing at a facility in Europe. View the full article

The first simulation of the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin rover driving off its landing platform closed out an incredible year of preparations as the mission now marches with confidence towards a September launch. View the full article

Watch live: our start-of-year press conference looking ahead at 2022, with ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and ESA Directors, from 10:00 CET on 18 January. View the full article

Astronauts on board the International Space Station are connecting straight to Europe at light speed, thanks to the European Data Relay System. View the full article

Video: 00:00:00 Immerse yourself in 360° of science with ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer as he prepares an experiment to examine how human cells behave in weightlessness. The Cytoskeleton experiment is a biological study that aims to determine the changing function of RhoGTPases when in vitro cell cultures are exposed to weightlessness. It will run in the Biolab facility of Europe’s Columbus laboratory. In this video, we see Matthias remove Cytoskeleton cell cultures from the Minus Eighty Lab Freezer ISS (MELFI) and prepare them in the Life Sciences Glovebox (LSG) before installing the experiment in Columbus’s BioLab. Matthias was launched to the International Space Station for his current Cosmic Kiss mission on 11 November 2021. In his approximately six months on board, he will support over 35 European experiments and many more international experiments in orbit. Find out more about Matthias and the science he will support on the ESA Cosmic Kiss mission website. Access the other Cosmic Kiss 360º videos View the full article

Week in images: 10 - 14 January 2022 Discover our week through the lens View the full article

Plato, ESA’s next-generation planet hunting mission, has been given the green light to continue with its development after the critical milestone review concluded successfully on 11 January 2022. View the full article

Image: Rolling stones on Mars View the full article

The Kangerlussuaq Glacier, one of Greenland’s largest tidewater outlet glaciers, is pictured in this false-colour image captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission. Meaning ‘large fjord’ in Greenlandic, the Kangerlussuaq Glacier flows into the head of the Kangerlussuaq Fjord, the second largest fjord in east Greenland. View the full article