ESA Top Multimedia

Josef Aschbacher, Director General of the European Space Agency, briefed journalists on the main milestones for 2026, such as the launch of Smile, a mission that will give humankind its first complete look at how Earth reacts to streams of particles and bursts of radiation from the Sun. Later in 2026 should also see the arrival of BepiColombo at Mercury after its eight-year trip, where it will gather data to answer many perplexing questions about the least-explored planet of the inner Solar System. Many more exciting missions are expected, with ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot launching for the International Space Station, and various Earth Observation and Navigation launches from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana.

Download the press briefing slides

Clearing of tropical forest in Peru 1995–2020

Sextans A PAHs pull-out (NIRCam and MIRI image)

Mars Express sees sandblasted wind sculptures near Eumenides Dorsum

Location of Cloud-9

Tree planting for εpsilon

As she flew 400 km above Earth at hypersonic speed, NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps caught a gigantic spark with blue and red flashes shooting upwards.  

This video shows a blue jet propagating into space towards the upper layers of the atmosphere. The beam of light is followed by red flashes spreading like tentacles across the sky.  

You can watch the magnificent show at different speeds, but in reality, it lasted less than a second.  

Jeanette directed a high-resolution camera from the International Space Station towards a summer thunderstorm. With the camera set at the fastest frame rate for slow-motion video, she managed to record the giant jet in all its splendour.   

What the astronaut captured from orbit in July 2024 is rarely visible on Earth because it takes place above the clouds, at altitudes between 40 and 80 kilometres. This powerful yet elusive electrical phenomenon is known as a Transient Luminous Event (TLE). 

ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen captured the first pulsating jet from space a decade ago, providing a new perspective on electrical activity at the top of thunderstorms. Scientists began to learn what types of clouds trigger such phenomena and how they impact the chemistry of the atmosphere. 

Her recording is part of the Thor-Davis experiment designed to investigate lightning in the upper atmosphere and how it might affect the concentration of greenhouse gases. The experiment is called Thor after the god of thunder, lightning and storms in Nordic mythology, and is led by the Danish Technical University (DTU) together with ESA. 

Lightning triggers powerful electrical bursts in our atmosphere almost every second, yet the inner workings of these forces of nature are still not fully understood. Capturing such phenomena is vital for scientists researching Earth’s weather systems.  

Long-distance relationship

Circumstellar disc IRAS 23077+6707

On 17 December 2025, two new Galileo satellites lifted off from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. This was the 14th launch for Europe’s satellite navigation operational satellite programme, reinforcing Europe’s resilience and autonomy. The flight, VA266, was the first launch of Galileo satellites on Europe’s newest heavy-lift launcher Ariane 6. 

The satellites, designated SAT 33 and SAT 34, separated from the launcher after a flight of just under four hours. The launch was declared successful after acquisition of signal and the confirmation that both satellites are healthy with their solar arrays deployed. 

“With these new satellites, we strengthen Europe’s global navigation services - delivering greater precision, reliability and autonomy in space”, affirmed Andrius Kubilius, EU Commissioner for Defence and Space.  

“Galileo stands as the world’s most accurate global navigation satellite system – and today we have increased its reliability and robustness,” said Josef Aschbacher, ESA’s Director General.  

The European Space Agency was responsible for carrying out the Galileo launch with Arianespace on behalf of the European Commission. The Galileo satellites were manufactured by OHB, under contract with ESA. Now in orbit, the EU Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) brings the satellites into service and oversees their operation. 

Follow the launch campaign. 

Access the related broadcast quality video material. 

This week Earth from Space features a wintery image: a red and white sphere that, if seen from a distance, resembles a festive decoration.

Galactic gas makes a getaway

Watch the replay of the media information session in which ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and ESA Council Chair Renato Krpoun (CH) update journalists on key decisions taken at the ESA Council meeting, held at ESA Headquarters in Paris on 17 and 18 December 2025.

Ever wondered how planetary systems like our own Solar System form? Thanks to the European Space Agency’s Gaia space telescope, we're getting a unique peek behind the cosmic curtain into these dusty environments.

In this collage, we see the images of 31 baby star systems. Click on the white dots next to each system to find out more about them. The bar on the top right shows the scale of the image in Astronomical Units (AU).

The collage also shows our own Solar System for reference on the bottom right, as it is predicted to have looked at an age of 1 million years, with the Sun at its centre (not visible).

All of the systems are centred around very young stars that have recently collapsed from vast clouds of gas and dust.

After the clouds collapsed under their own gravity, they spun faster and flattened into discs with hot, dense centres. These centres became the stars, sometimes multiple stars were formed. The discs around them are called protoplanetary discs.

The 31 baby systems are shown here in orange-purple, as seen by the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) ground-based telescope.

Astronomers expect the remaining material in protoplanetary discs to clump together to form planets, but until now it’s been very difficult to spot them because of all the dust and gas present in discs. To date, very few planets have been detected around forming stars.

Enter Gaia.

In 31 out of 98 young star systems, Gaia has detected subtle motions that suggest the presence of unseen companions. For seven of these systems, the observed motions are consistent with objects of planetary mass. In eight systems, the data best match the presence of brown dwarfs – objects larger than planets but smaller than stars. The remaining sixteen systems likely have additional stars around.

Gaia’s predicted locations of these companions in the systems are shown in cyan. In the reference image of our baby Solar System, Jupiter’s orbit is also shown in cyan.

Gaia discovered the companions in the baby star systems thanks to its unique ability to sense the gravitational tug or ‘wobble’ a planet or companion induces on a star. This technique had already been used to find companions around older stars. But now, for the first time, a team of astronomers led by Miguel Vioque of the European Southern Observatory, Germany, has used this Gaia technique to find planets and companions around stars that are still forming.

The all-sky, large-scale nature of the Gaia survey enabled the team to study hundreds of forming stars and identify companions across large samples for the first time. This in contrast to costly ground-based searches that can only target a few stars at a time.

This ability of Gaia is revolutionising the field of star and planet formation. The companions that the telescope has already found, can now be followed up by telescopes like the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space telescope that can study the inner discs of the baby systems in more detail.

With Gaia’s upcoming fourth data release, many more hidden planets are expected to be uncovered.

This new finding has been described in ‘Astrometric view of companions in the inner dust cavities of protoplanetary disks’ by M. Vioque et al., accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics. 

Learn more

[Image description: A collage of 32 glowing discs on a black background. Each disc shows concentric rings in vivid colours: purple, orange, and yellow, with bright cyan centres. The discs vary in size and orientation, creating a striking pattern of circular and elliptical shapes.]