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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ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, Juice, is humanity’s next Jupiter explorer. The bold mission will make detailed observations of the giant gas planet and its three large ocean-bearing moons – Ganymede, Callisto and Europa – with a suite of instruments. Juice will characterise these moons as both planetary objects and possible habitats, explore Jupiter’s complex environment in depth, and study the wider Jupiter system as an archetype for gas giants across the Universe.
The mission will not be easy: Juice’s makers have overcome enormous scientific and technical challenges to plan its journey, construct its body, programme its brain and finetune its ingenious instruments. Having overcome challenges that no other European mission has ever had to face, the people behind Juice are now confident of success.
Juice will spend four years in the Jovian system, with the first 3.5 years spent orbiting Jupiter and making flybys of the three moons. During this phase of the mission, Juice will study Jupiter’s turbulent atmosphere, its enormous magnetic field and the dusty rings and myriad smaller moons that orbit the planet.
Discover the main questions that Juice seeks to answer about Jupiter and its environment.