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
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Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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A peculiar X-ray source spotted in the globular cluster NGC 6540 as part of a collaboration between scientists at the National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF) in Milan, Italy, and a group of students from a local high school.
In 2005, ESA’s XMM-Newton saw this source undergo a flare that boosted the luminosity of the source by up to 50 times its normal level for about five minutes.
Too short to be an ordinary stellar flare, but too faint to be linked to a compact object, this event is challenging our understanding of X-ray outbursts.
Full story: Students digging into data archive spot mysterious X-ray source