Artist's impression of the SMART-1 mission

ESA’s Rosetta cometary mission (2004) will examine the raw materials from which the Sun’s family of planets was built. Mars Express (2003) and BepiColombo will investigate why Mars and Mercury are very different from the Earth, despite their common origin.

The idea that the Earth was altered by a huge collision, which created the Moon, will be tested by the lunar spacecraft SMART-1 (2003). And by measuring regional gravity far more accurately than ever before, ESA’s GOCE satellite (2005) will reveal the internal machinery that renews the Earth’s distinctively fresh surface.
 
 
Last update: 20 April 2004