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Students kick off experiments on ESA’s flat floor

The Greta engine firing up on a new mobile test stand in Trauen, Germany. Greta was ignited multiple times from July to November 2025 and showed stable operations, including controlled shutdowns. During the test campaign the engine fired continuously for over 40 seconds at a time.

The Greta project, part of the European Space Agency’s Future Launchers Preparatory Programme is developing a 5 kN thrust class rocket engine that can be restarted reliably several times.

Greta uses hydrogen peroxide and ethanol as propellants, a more sustainable alternative with a lower carbon footprint compared to monomethyl hydrazine propellant used by most traditional rocket engines in this thrust range.

Greta was tested on a new, low-cost and versatile mobile test stand with instruments measuring data such as pressure and temperature, which will be used to further optimise the engine.

Greta’s 30-cm high combustion chamber is built up in layers by melting metal powders with a laser. This technique allows for complex shapes to be made that would be difficult to achieve with conventional metallurgy. For example, the Greta engine is cooled by passing fluid through complex channels built into the engine as close as possible to the inner wall of the chamber which is in contact with the hot – over 2000°C – combustion gases.

ArianeGroup in Ottobrunn, Germany is the prime contractor for Greta. This type of engine could be used on lunar landers or on kick stages, such as Astris that is being developed for Europe’s Ariane 6 rocket.

Born in France in 1982, Sophie Adenot is an engineer, helicopter test pilot and colonel in the French Air and Space Force. Selected as an ESA astronaut in 2022, she completed her basic training at the European Astronaut Centre in 2024 and launched to the International Space Station on 13 February 2026 for her first mission, εpsilon.

The joint European-Chinese Smile mission will launch this spring from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, on a Vega-C rocket.

The rocket will place Smile into an almost-circular orbit around Earth’s poles.

Over the following month, Smile will gradually alter its orbit, firing its engines as it flies over Antarctica. Its final orbit will take it 121 000 km above the North Pole to collect information on Earth’s magnetic field and the northern lights, before flying close over the South Pole to deliver its data.

This special orbit will enable Smile to spend about 80% of its time at high altitude above the northern hemisphere, collecting continuous observations of the northern lights for 45 hours at a time.

After Smile has reached this final ‘science orbit’, it will deploy a three-metre-long boom that carries two magnetometer sensors at the end. These sensors will measure the strength and direction of magnetic fields around the spacecraft.

Known as ‘MAG’, data from this science instrument will be combined with data from Smile’s X-ray camera, ultraviolet camera, and particle detector to give humankind its first complete look at how Earth reacts to streams of particles and bursts of radiation from the Sun.

By improving our understanding of the solar wind, solar storms and space weather, Smile will fill a stark gap in our understanding of the Solar System and help keep our technology and astronauts safe in the future.

Watch Smile’s launch and solar panel deployment (artist impression) here.

Smile (the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer) is a joint mission between the European Space Agency and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot during one of her first workouts at the start of the εpsilon mission.

The Sun doesn't feel like a threat – until it does. 

Solar storms can put on beautiful light shows in the night sky, known as auroras. But they can also cause serious problems for the technology we rely on every day. Strong solar activity can interfere with communications, power grids and navigation systems on Earth and satellites in orbit.

Although we cannot stop such space weather from happening, we can limit its impact. The most effective protection comes from carefully monitoring the Sun and the effects of solar activity on the space environment around Earth. This information can be shared with system operators through services similar to weather reports and forecasts, so the operators can take protective action when needed.

Observing space weather and reducing its risks are activities of ESA’s Space Safety programme. ESA is building a wide range of space weather services, brought together in the ESA Space Weather Service Network, supported by data from ESA's own space weather sensors deployed in space. These services help industry and spacecraft operators respond quickly and effectively when space weather events occur. 

Learn more about Space Weather at ESA and the ESA Space Weather Service network.

Watch all Space safety hazards videos.

The team explores the technical complexities of laser-based collision avoidance, an approach to safely redirect space junk away from the path of active satellites.

With space getting increasingly crowded, space debris represents a major problem to future missions. Vital services like communications, navigation and weather forecasting are severely limited without functioning satellites.

The European Space Agency is already making use of laser technology to detect and monitor space debris with the Izaña laser ranging station complex. But what if we could also use laser technology to actually prevent collisions?

ESA, from its European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), began exploring this concept with a general feasibility study funded by its Space Safety Programme. This effort has since progressed: meet OMLET (Orbit Maintenance via Laser MomEntum Transfer), a ground-based solution being advanced to mitigate collision risk into low Earth orbit.

Based on a high-power laser platform integrated with precision pointing systems and adaptive optics, this concept will enable the application of small, controlled velocity changes to space debris objects. Through the interaction between the laser beam and the illuminated object, a slight trajectory adjustment could reduce the probability of conjunction or even prevent collisions.

OMLET is currently transitioning from requirement definition stage to design and implementation. The current Phase A/B1 is carried out by an international consortiumconsortium led by the Institute of Technical Physics at the German Aerospace Centre (DLR).

The SpaceX Dragon carrying four Crew-12 members, including ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot, nears the International Space Station for a docking to the Harmony module’s space-facing port.

Watch the docking operations of Crew-12 to the International Space Station (ISS), which took place on 14 February 2026 at 21:15 CET. The docking is followed by the hatch opening and the welcome remarks by the astronauts already present in the ISS.                                        

ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot flies as mission specialist. The other Crew-12 members are NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, respectively commander and pilot of the mission, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev, mission specialist.

The French ESA astronaut is the first of her class, the Hoppers, to fly. Sophie has chosen the name εpsilon for her mission, which may last up to nine months. On board the Station, she will conduct a wide range of tasks, including European-led scientific experiments and medical research, support Earth observation activities, and contribute to operations and maintenance on the Station.

Watch the launch of ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot to the International Space Station (ISS), aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre. Sophie flies as mission specialist. The other Crew-12 members are NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, respectively commander and pilot of the mission, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev, mission specialist.

Watch the liftoff of ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot to the International Space Station (ISS), aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre. Sophie flies as mission specialist. The other Crew-12 members are NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, respectively commander and pilot of the mission, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev, mission specialist.

Watch the full launch replay. 

At 16:45 GMT/17:45 CET the first Ariane 6 rocket with four boosters lifted off from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on 12 February, taking 32 Amazon Leo satellites to orbit.

This is Ariane 6’s most powerful version yet. The new three-stage European rocket can be adapted according to each mission with either two or four boosters as well as the length of the fairing – the nosecone that splits vertically in two. This launch was the sixth Ariane 6 flight, the first to fly with four boosters and also the first with the long fairing.

Ariane 6 in its four-booster configuration, known as Ariane 64, doubles the rocket’s performance compared to the two-booster version that has flown five times including the inaugural flight in 2024. The P120C boosters used by Ariane 6 are one of the most powerful one-piece motors in production in the world. Flying with four boosters takes Ariane 6 to a whole new class of rockets. With the extra thrust from two more boosters Ariane 6 can take around 21.6 tonnes to low Earth orbit, more than double the 10.3 tonnes it could bring to orbit with just two boosters.

Crew-12 in front of a SpaceX booster