Resum d’activitats anual

ESA
NASA
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Clocks, gravity, and the limits of relativity

The International Space Station will host the most precise clocks ever to leave Earth. Accurate to a second in 300 million years the clocks will push the measurement of time to test the limits of the theory of relativity and our understanding of gravity.

A unique experiment to explore black holes

What happens when two supermassive black holes collide? Combining the observing power of two future ESA missions, Athena and LISA, would allow us to study these cosmic clashes and their mysterious aftermath for the first time.

Mission control 'saves science'

Every minute, ESA’s Earth observation satellites gather dozens of gigabytes of data about our planet – enough information to fill the pages on a 100-metre long bookshelf. Flying in low-Earth orbits, these spacecraft are continuously taking the pulse of our planet, but it's teams on the ground at ESA’s Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany, that keep our explorers afloat.

Satellites yield insight into not so permanent permafrost

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 is also thawing, adding to the climate crisis and causing immediate problems for local communities.

A quarter of glacier ice in West Antarctica is now unstable

By combining 25 years of ESA satellite data, scientists have discovered that warming ocean waters have caused the ice to thin so rapidly that 24% of the glacier ice in West Antarctica is now affected.

Boulders on Bennu

An abundance of boulders litters the surface