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
Go to topicThank you for liking
You have already liked this page, you can only like it once!
Numerous Langmuir probes have flown in space, used to measure plasma properties, and their design has scarcely changed since they were first invented back in 1924: a series of voltages is applied to the probe, and the collected currents are used to identify properties of the plasma, such as electron and ion density, and temperature. This multi-needle Langmuir Probe (m-NLP) from Eidsvoll Electronics and the University of Oslo instead extends a quartet of miniature cylinders, each set to a different, but fixed, voltage, producing a much narrower spatial resolution – down to less than two metres.