Fuelled for launch! ⛽ Specialists wearing ‘SCAPE’ suits filled Smile with fuel ahead of its launch on a Vega-C rocket on 9 April. Smile will use 90% of its fuel during the first month in space to gradually elongate its orbit until it ultimately reaches 121 000 km above the North Pole. 🔭 ☀️

XRISM solves the 50-year mystery of a famous star 🌟 An invisible companion consuming material from the star gamma-Cas has been revealed as the culprit for curious X-rays coming from the stellar system 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪

Nearly a millennium ago, astronomers witnessed a supernova so bright it was visible in daylight for weeks. A quarter-century after its first observations of the expanding remnant, the Crab Nebula, Hubble goes back for a fresh look 👉 esahubble.org/news/heic2607/ 🔭 🧪

The Smile mission will view the full Sun-Earth connection, helping us solve 3️⃣ mysteries: 🌬️ 🌍 What happens where solar wind meets Earth’s magnetic shield? 🌍 ⚠️ What causes magnetic glitches on the dark side of Earth? 🚨 🧲 How can we predict the most dangerous magnetic storms earlier? 🔭 🧪

🚨New article alert🚨From icy moons to icy interstellar objects! 💫 If you were wowed by @esa.int 's Juice images of 3I/ATLAS, you’ll be even more wowed when you learn how the mission team managed to pull off the unprecedented observation campaign. 🛰️ Read here 👉 www.esa.int/Enabling_Sup...

A sky full of clues Sparking infinite questions Who are we truly?   First see and wonder Then think, build, test, launch, fly, seek Eureka! New find.   Truth waits in the dark Minds map the infinite sky Wonder never ends. Happy #WorldPoetryDay!

🚨 Media invitation 🚨 The Smile mission is set to launch on 9 April at 08:29 CEST. If you're a journalist, join one of our online media briefings in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. Register by 17:00 CET on 23 March. Details here 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 1/2 🔭 🧪 ☀️

🚨 We have a launch date! The Smile mission is set to launch on a Vega-C rocket from Europe’s Spaceport on Thursday 9 April at 08:29 CEST. A collaboration between ESA and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Smile will study how Earth responds to the solar wind from the Sun. 1/2 🔭 🧪 ☀️

DYK? SOHO brings you live views of the Sun 😎 See the latest images from two instruments on board SOHO 👉 https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Live_view_of_the_Sun_from_SOHO Images from EIT give scientists weather maps of the Sun, while in LASCO images they can see the corona. 🔭 🧪

Looking for planetary data? 😎 Our Planetary Science Archive gives you access to data collected from missions such as Venus Express, Mars Express or Rosetta. Check it out here 👉 https://psa.esa.int/psa/#/pages/home 🔭 🧪

🔴 #LiveNow: media briefing following the 345th ESA Council meeting. 📺 watch.esa.int/Two/

January–March 2026 was a busy season for us! Get up to speed on European space with our new ESA Impact visual report, out now 👉 esamultimedia.esa.int/multimedia/p...

Hubble has caught a comet crumbling while on its way out of the Solar System! ☄️ Comet K1 fragmented into at least four pieces, each with a distinct coma. Read more 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪 1/2

#WatchLive: Join us on 19 March at 13:00 GMT/14:00 CET for a media briefing following the 345th ESA Council meeting taking place in Interlaken, Switzerland. 📺 watch.esa.int

A successful deep-space manoeuvre has put ESA’s Hera spacecraft on course for arrival at the Didymos binary asteroid system later this year! At Didymos, Hera will help turn asteroid deflection into a reliable technique for protecting Earth 🛡️🌍 www.esa.int/Space_Safety...

40 years ago, the Giotto mission was writing history:  🛰️ ESA's first deep space mission ☄️ first cometary close flyby ⏰ and later on, first reactivation of a spacecraft The success of Giotto inspired our Rosetta mission and together laid the foundation for our Comet Interceptor mission. 🔭 🧪 1/3

🚀 10 years ago, our largest and most sophisticated martian explorer left Earth behind. To mark the launch anniversary, here are 5 remarkable things @esa.int's Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) was made for 🧵👇

🧃 Juice update! 👩‍💻 Science teams are busy analysing the 3I/ATLAS data received from five Juice science instruments ☄️ They're also looking forward to a star occultation by Jupiter’s moon Kallichore on 18 March, which could refine its known position – valuable data for a possible 2031 flyby. 1/2 🔭🧪

Welcome to the Large Space Simulator! 🌌 Our terrestrial planet hunter, Plato, has been placed inside this ESA chamber for a series of vital tests under space‑like conditions. Discover how it is like inside Europe's largest cryovacuum chamber here 👉 www.esa.int/ESA_Multimed... 🔭 🧪

MN Colibri delivers the Smile satellite and the Vega-C upper stage in Kourou, French Guiana. Following the docking, the containers were carefully unloaded and taken by lorry to Europe's Spaceport, which lies just a few kilometres away from the town of Kourou. 📽️ 👇 🔭 🧪 ☀️

🚨 UPDATE: fireball over Europe – 8 March 2026 At 18:55 CET on Sunday, 8 March, a very bright fireball streaked across the skies of Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands, glowing for around six seconds before fragmenting. 🧪🔭 🎥 Allsky7

🚢 🚚 Following a two-week journey, Inspector Smile has arrived at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana. Smile travelled with another friend onboard: the Vega-C upper stage, which will stay attached to Smile until the last moment before dropping it off in a very precise orbit around Earth. 🔭 🧪 🌞

☄️ Asteroid 2024 YR4 will not impact the Moon in 2032! New observations from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have confirmed that the object will pass safely at a distance of more than 20 000 km. (Pic: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, M. Micheli (ESA NEOCC)

🗞️The latest edition of the ESA Science Newsletter is out! 🔴 Our Archival Research Visitor Programme call is open 🔴 We're getting ready for Plato's Guest Observers Programme 🔴 Public presentations of candidates for next M-Class mission on 22 April Read & subscribe 👉 cosmos.esa.int/web/scinews 🔭 ☄️

🆕 Cast your mind back to May 2024... remember how a massive solar storm triggered northern lights across Europe? We can now reveal how this same solar storm affected Mars, thanks to clever teamwork from our two Mars orbiters. Find out more 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪 ☀️

Craters, craters, and yet more craters! Our latest snapshot from Mars Express is packed full of them. Discover this slice of ancient, battered land in more depth, including a zoomable, labelled version of this main image as well as close-up and 3D views 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪

Zoom into a cosmic eye 👁️ This video takes you on a journey through space to one of the most visually intricate remnants of a dying star: the Cat’s Eye Nebula 🐈‍⬛ also known as NGC 6543. 🔭 🧪

🤝 Hubble has teamed up with Euclid to image the intricate Cat’s Eye Nebula! 😻 Combining their focused views highlights the nebula’s exquisite structure, while placing it within the broader context. Read more 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪

🛰️☀️ Solar Orbiter hits its 9th perihelion this week, diving to 0.29 AU from the Sun. This kicks off a 10 day Remote Sensing Window where teams rapidly plan, image, analyse and reorient the spacecraft – a showcase of ESA’s teamwork near our star. ⭐ 📷ESA/J.Mai

☀️🌑🛰️ 2026: The year we arrive at Mercury! After almost 8 years since its launch in 2018, BepiColombo is entering its most critical phase yet. It is about to end its interplanetary phase and initiate its Mercury approach.

There is a paradox at the heart of Solar Orbiter. On one hand, we wanted to take the closest ever images of the Sun. On the other, the closer we'd go, the more damaging the light we sought to collect would become. Discover how technology solved that paradox 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭

Our first glimpse of comet 3I/ATLAS from Juice's science camera 😍☄️ The precious data from the mission's November observations of the interstellar comet arrived on Earth last week. Teams are now digging in to discover what they reveal. Stay tuned for updates! More 👉 www.esa.int/ESA_Multimed... 🔭 🧪

📣 Call for journalists: attend the Smile launch media event at Europe’s Spaceport! Smile is a scientific collaboration between ESA and the Chinese Academy of Science. The mission will study how Earth responds to the solar wind. Registration details 👉 www.esa.int/Newsroom/Pre... 1/2 🔭 🧪 ☀️

Astronomers are losing their heads over the latest images from Webb - the Cranium Nebula 💀🧠 Read more 👉 esawebb.org/news/weic2605/ 🔭 🧪

We've long waited for a star to explode as a supernova in a galaxy that Webb had already observed. In June 2025 such a supernova was detected in NGC 1637. A look back at Webb observations of the galaxy enabled astronomers the track down the star that went bang 💥 esawebb.org/news/weic2604/ 🔭 🧪

Just a few days left to apply to our ESA Graduate Trainee opportunities. You can submit your application to a maximum of three positions until 28 February. More details here 👉 https://www.esa.int/About_Us/Careers_at_ESA/Apply_now_to_the_ESA_Graduate_Trainee_Programme #ESArecruits 🔭🧪

Envision this – launching a mission to Venus to understand why Earth's twin evolved so differently. Teams at ESA have been working on making this vision a reality.  Discover more at esa.int/envision 🔭

Picture this: the light captured by Webb in this image has been journeying to us since soon after T-rex 🦖 went extinct. NGC 5134 is a spiral galaxy located 65 million light-years away  👉 https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2026/02/The_stellar_lifecycle_in_a_nearby_spiral 🔭 🧪

Inspector Smile's departure from the Netherlands to French Guiana, as it happened 📹 👇 🔭 🧪

On 17 February, there was an annular solar eclipse visible only from Antarctica… and from space! 👇ESA’s Proba-2 satellite recorded the same eclipse no less than four times as it whizzed round Earth! 📷Credit: ESA/Royal Observatory of Belgium

🚢 Inspector Smile has begun a two-week voyage across the Atlantic, heading for Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. In the early hours of 11 February, Smile left ESA’s technical heart by truck for the Port of Amsterdam, where it was loaded onto the cargo ship MN Colibri. 🔭 🧪

Webb maps the mysterious upper atmosphere of Uranus 🔵 This first vertical view of its ionosphere reveals auroras shaped by the planet's tilted magnetic field and how Uranus’s atmosphere has continued to cool over the past three decades. Read more 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭 🧪

Planet Earth. 2026 AD. For almost four billion years, Earth has been holding up a giant shield against the relentless Sun. 🌞🌬️ Its foe? The solar wind. 🛡️ The shield? Earth’s magnetic field. 🐉 The evidence? Earth's auroras. 🤖 Our investigator? Meet Inspector Smile! 🔭 🧪

Hubble has joined forces with ESA's Euclid and NAOJ's Subaru Telescope in Hawaii to identify a galaxy that appears to be 99% dark matter! Read more 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭🧪

Kick start your space career! Until 28 February, you can apply to around 100 ESA Graduate Trainee positions if you've recently graduated or are in your final Master's year. Check out all conditions here 👉 www.esa.int/About_Us/Car... #ESArecruits 🔭🧪

Around 100 ESA Graduate Trainee positions are open for candidates in their final year of Master's or who have just graduated. Check out all conditions here 👉 https://www.esa.int/About_Us/Careers_at_ESA/Apply_now_to_the_ESA_Graduate_Trainee_Programme #ESArecruits 🔭🧪

Gravitational waves constantly cross our Solar System. They travel in the fabric of spacetime, and, until recently, they did so undetected. But advances in technology have made measurements possible on the ground and, with our upcoming LISA mission, from space too 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭

‘Save the best for last 😋’, a little rocky planet discovered by our #ESACheops might think – born later than its gaseous sibling-planets, it might flip our understanding of how planets form upside down. Our full story 👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl... 🔭🧪 #exoplanets #milkyway #planetsci

I had a constructive first meeting in Washington, D.C. with my counterpart at NASA, Administrator Jared Isaacman. We had a very constructive discussion on space exploration and are fully aligned on our shared objectives: the Moon, LEO, and Mars. Looking forward to continuing the discussions.

Working back through the history of European space, we can trace the origins of today’s ESA Science programme to the original eight-year plan for Europe's first space organisation ESRO (and why the 'Blue Book' was blue!) historicalarchives.esa.int/1961-blue-bo... @science.esa.int @cmundell.esa.int