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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This image shows the Aquila Rift star-forming complex, based on a combination of data from ESA’s Herschel and Planck space telescopes. The bright areas in the picture shows the emission by interstellar dust grains in three different wavelengths observed by Herschel (250, 350, and 500 microns) and the lines crossing the image in a ‘drapery pattern’ represent the magnetic field orientation (based on the Planck data.)
The Aquila Rift is a region that spans the constellations of Aquila and Serpens and contains the Aquila Rift cloud complex. This harbours the Serpens star-forming region, a part of which is shown in this image, which has widespread filaments.
The bright area towards the left is a network of filaments contains the Westerhout 40 (W40) star forming region. W40 contains both massive and low-mass stars, and the ionising radiation from the newly formed massive stars has created a so-called H II region, which is a cloud of partially ionised hydrogen gas. Around 520 young stars are located in W40. The bright area visible on the right of the image is the young star MWC 297, which powers the diffuse nebula Sh 2-62 around it.