Smile spacecraft during mechanical testing

Smile will study Earth’s magnetic environment (its magnetosphere) on a global scale, building a more complete understanding of the Sun-Earth connection. It will do this by observing the flow of charged particles streaming out from the Sun into interplanetary space (the solar wind) and exploring how these interact with the space around our planet.

This image shows Smile during a mechanical test of the spacecraft qualification model in 2022.

Smile is a joint mission between ESA and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. ESA is providing Smile’s payload module, which carries the scientific instruments, the payload module equipment control unit and the communication channel that downlinks all the science data to the ground.