The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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Scientists believe that our Solar System formed about 4.5 billion years ago and, since then, its planets and moons have all evolved in very different ways. Venus Express is one of a series of highly successful ESA missions to understand such spectacular variety and how the solar system works.
Mars Express is searching the red planet for water, the main element for the origins of life; in 2005 the ESA probe Huygens landed on Saturn’s moon, Titan, one of the most Earth-like bodies in the Solar System and Smart-1 flew to the Moon in 2003 to investigate its hidden craters. Rosetta will rendezvous with comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014 after a 10-year interplanetary journey to put a lander onto its surface. A detailed study of its nucleus and environment will help scientists to understand if comets, the oldest objects in the solar system, brought water and life to Earth.
With the launch of BepiColombo, Europe will explore Mercury, the nearest planet to the Sun, to see how planets close to stars form and evolve. ESA spacecrafts will then have explored all terrestrial planets.