ESA Top Multimedia

Meet FLEX

Using cutting-edge technology, ESA’s FLEX mission is designed to reveal new insights into how plants function by measuring the faint fluorescence they emit when they capture light during photosynthesis. Although invisible to the human eye, this signal changes with environmental conditions and plant health – allowing scientists to assess vegetation health, and stress. The FLEX satellite is equipped with the Fluorescence Imaging Spectrometer (FLORIS), an instrument designed specifically to detect and map this delicate glow from space.

ROSIE: Cluster's Samba and Tango Re-entry Observation Campaign

ROSIE (Re-entry Observation and Scientific Investigation Experiment) airborne campaign B-rolls.Filmed from a specially equipped research aircraft operating from Tonga, the campaign observed the controlled atmospheric re-entries of ESA's Cluster spacecraft Samba and Tango over the South Pacific Ocean. An international team of scientists and engineers used a suite of instruments to capture imagery and scientific measurements of the break-up and burn-up of the satellites during re-entry. ROSIE supports ESA's re-entry research activities, helping to improve understanding of spacecraft demise and contributing to the development of safer and more sustainable space systems.

Samba's reentry recorded

Media briefing: BepiColombo's next milestone towards Mercury

Rewatch the European Space Agency's 31 August 2026 online press briefing on the latest developments of the ESA/JAXA BepiColombo mission, Europe's and Japan's first mission to Mercury.

This briefing focused on the complexities of the separation of the Mercury Transfer Module (MTM), scheduled for 3 September 2026, a critical milestone marking the start of BepiColombo’s Mercury arrival phase. It also provided an overview of the operational challenges and milestones ahead, including Mercury orbit insertion in November 2026 and the separation of the two science orbiters (ESA's MPO and JAXA's Mio) in December 2026.

The briefing also provided an update on the mission’s status and explored the scientific opportunities that await as BepiColombo prepares to begin operations around Mercury. Journalists had the opportunity to ask questions following the presentations from three speakers:

Prof. Geraint Jones, Lead Project Scientist, ESA
Santa Martinez, Mission Manager, ESA
Ignacio Tanco, Head of Inner Solar System Mission Operations, ESA

BepiColombo will be the most complex mission ever sent to Mercury. Its orbiters will be only the second and third to orbit the planet. Close to the Sun and more difficult for an orbiter to reach than Pluto, this small desert world is the least explored planet of the inner Solar System. Learning more about Mercury will shed light on the history of the entire Solar System.

The mission is a collaboration between ESA and JAXA, the latter providing the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (Mio).

Click here for a set of explanatory infographics

What happened this month at the European Space Agency? (August 2026)

August was a busy month for ESA, between spectacular views, historic milestones and exciting new discoveries.

From a total solar eclipse broadcast live from Spain and Sophie Adenot’s historic spacewalks, to the launch of MTG-I2 aboard Ariane 6, a breathtaking flight over Mars and a surprising discovery near our galaxy’s central black hole, here’s your monthly roundup from the European Space Agency.

Roman lifts off on a mission to survey the infrared sky

NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope lifted off on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA, at 07:26 EDT / 12:26 BST/ 13:26 CEST on 30 August 2026. With the successful launch, Roman began its mission to survey the sky in visible to near-infrared light to help reveal the nature of dark energy and dark matter. The telescope will also investigate the true diversity of exoplanets in our galaxy.

Roman is a NASA-led mission to which the European Space Agency (ESA) contributed star trackers, batteries, and detectors for the coronagraph instrument. ESA will also provide communications support through its deep-space ground station network, and enable data download using its new 35-metre antenna in New Norcia, Australia.

“I warmly congratulate our colleagues at NASA on the successful launch of Roman,” says Carole Mundell, ESA’s Director of Science. “ESA is proud to have provided essential hardware and to continue supporting Roman’s ambitious scientific goals. Together, we are opening new windows on the cosmos.”

Like ESA’s Euclid space telescope, Roman will enable astronomers to study the Universe in unprecedented detail. It is equipped with a primary mirror of 2.4 m and two instruments: the Wide Field Instrument (WFI) and a Coronagraph Instrument technology demonstration.

With its panoramic view of the sky, crisp infrared vision and quick re-orientation skills, Roman will perform fast and efficient surveys of a large area of the sky. By doing so, it will map clustering of galaxies over time and space and also study the light coming from thousands of distant type Ia supernovas which will help astronomers trace the expansion of the Universe.

“Roman should provide our clearest picture yet of whether dark energy is truly constant or whether it evolves over cosmic time – either outcome would have profound implications for our understanding of the Universe. I'm also excited by Roman's exoplanet census, which will discover thousands of new worlds, including cold planets and free-floating planets that have remained largely beyond our reach until now,” says Bethan James, ESA’s Roman Project Scientist. “Perhaps what excites me most is the unexpected. With its unprecedented combination of depth, area, and image quality, Roman has every opportunity to surprise us.”

After launch, Roman is on a steady course to the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point (L2), nearly 1.5 million km away from Earth. This location allows the telescope to have an unobstructed view of a wide area of the sky, almost 12%. Like ESA’s Euclid and the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, Roman will move in a wider orbit around the L2 point – much larger than the Moon’s orbit around Earth.

In the next three months following launch, the Roman team will conduct a carefully orchestrated series of deployments, calibrations, and tests. Once the commissioning period is complete, the mission will begin its science operations, starting with the first science image release. Roman will spend at least five years scanning the infrared sky and is designed to work in space for another five years.

[Image description: A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket with NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on board is seen transiting the Sun during launch from Launch Complex 39A, on Sunday 30 August 2026, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, US.]

Sophie Adenot's third spacewalk (U.S. Spacewalk 99)

ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot will take part in her third spacewalk during U.S. Spacewalk 99 on Tuesday 1 September. NASA live coverage will begin at 13:00 CEST, with the spacewalk expected to start at approximately 14:30 CEST and last around six and a half hours.

Together with NASA astronaut Jessica Meir, she will replace a retroreflector on the International Space Station’s Harmony module, supporting spacecraft navigation during rendezvous and docking operations. The astronauts will also carry out several maintenance tasks, including installing data-relay system jumper cables, preparing the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer’s radiator for future maintenance and replacing a high-definition camera on the station’s truss.

Fuelling Sentinel-3C

Ariane 6 launch with MTG-I2 – highlights

The Meteosat Third Generation-Imager2 (MTG-I2) satellite, has been launched on board an Ariane 6 launcher from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. Liftoff was on 27 August 2026 at 22:11 CEST (17:10 local time).

MTG-I2 is part of the MTG constellation for Eumetsat – two are already in orbit – and it will produce images for weather forecasting in Europe in unprecedented detail. This mission provides completely new data products and capabilities for European weather services, especially suited to nowcasting of severe weather events.

The MTG-Imager satellites carry two instruments, a Lightning Imager and a Flexible Combined Imager. The Lightning Imager offers completely new capabilities for European meteorological satellites by continuously monitoring for lightning. By doing this from geostationary orbit, at an altitude of about 36 000 km above the equator, it can scan more than 80% of Earth’s surface seen from that viewpoint.

The Flexible Combined Imager, on the other hand, builds a picture of fast-evolving weather systems and can be used to issue timely weather warnings. It is particularly relevant for air traffic safety. It is able to scan its view of Earth in just 10 minutes and can scan Europe and northern Africa every 2.5 minutes.

When MTG is fully operational, it is expected to produce at least 50 times more data than the previous Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) satellites.

This was the ninth launch of Europe’s heavy-lift rocket Ariane 6. For this launch, Ariane 6 was configured with two P120C-based solid-propellant rocket motors to launch MTG-I2 to a geostationary transfer orbit. This was the first mission to this destination for Ariane 6 and the farthest the rocket has flown so far. ESA manages the Ariane 6 development programme, ensuring autonomous access to space for the benefit of European citizens. Arianespace was the launch service provider for flight VA270.

Setting up instruments for airborne reentry observation campaign

MTG-I2 flies to space

Ariane 6 ready to launch MTG-I2

BepiColombo’s Mercury arrival begins – watch live

For decades, Mercury has been a challenging target for exploration. Orbiting deep within the Sun's powerful gravitational grip, it is a world of extremes and enduring mysteries.

Now, after an eight-year journey spanning nine planetary flybys, the joint European Space Agency (ESA) and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) mission, BepiColombo, is finally approaching the rocky planet and preparing for its most demanding phase yet: Mercury arrival.

The first major milestone in this carefully choreographed sequence is the separation of the Mercury Transfer Module (MTM) on 3 September 2026.

This critical step is the first in a challenging arrival campaign that will ultimately place Europe’s and Japan’s first Mercury orbiters around the Solar System’s innermost planet. Both spacecraft will begin their scientific studies of Mercury and its surrounding environment in April 2027.

Learn more about BepiColombo.

The depths of space, Euclid, LISA, and the mysterious effects of gravity – Expedition Sound 4

Ripples in the fabric of reality, distant galaxies acting as lenses, and filaments of galaxies stretching across the cosmos – gravity is more than just the force that keeps us from floating off the surface of Earth. In this final episode of Expedition Sound, we venture out into deep space and explore some of the extraordinary phenomena caused by gravity that we can observe with ESA’s space missions.

Guided by a sonification of a collage of so-called Einstein rings, we explore how gravity shapes the large-scale structure of the Universe and how ESA’s Euclid space telescope reveals objects that would otherwise remain hidden from view.

Along the way, we learn from Valeria Pettorino, Project Scientist of Euclid, about gravitational lensing, Einstein rings and the cosmic web of galaxies that stretches across the Universe.

In a conversation with Lorenzo Speri, Research Fellow working on ESA's upcoming LISA mission, we learn from each other through a sonification exchange. Lorenzo teaches us about gravitational waves through sound, and together we discuss how sonification can help us understand phenomena that are difficult to observe directly, while opening new doors to experiencing and communicating science.

Hosted by Zsófi Szalavári

Check out the image that the sonification illustrates here: https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2025/03/Strong_gravitational_lenses_captured_by_Euclid For the sonification, only 35 of the 112 images were used.

Learn more about ESA’s Euclid mission: esa.int/Euclid

Learn more about ESA’s LISA mission: esa.int/LISA

Citizen Science project ‘Space Warps’: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Euclid/Euclid_Space_Warps_help_spot_galaxies_bending_spacetime

Many thanks to Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space / Maple Pools) and Parsa Emamdadi for making the sonification in this episode. If you would like to hear more sonifications and music by Klaus, please visit: https://linktr.ee/maplepools 

Original theme music produced by Marci Szalavári (https://soundcloud.com/septrone-hd).

MTG-I2 ready for launch

The Meteosat Third Generation-Imager2 (MTG-I2) satellite, is ready for launch on board an Ariane 6 launcher from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. Lift off is scheduled for 27 August 2026 at 22:10 CEST (17:10 local time).

MTG-I2 is part of the MTG constellation for Eumetsat – two are already in orbit. It will produce images for weather forecasting in Europe in unprecedented detail. This mission provides completely new data products and capabilities for European weather services, especially suited to short-term forecasting of severe weather events.