The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
Go to topicMaps of the sky as seen by NASA’s COBE satellite, after different stages of image processing.
The top panel shows (in false colour) the temperature of the sky after removing a uniform (2.7 K) component due to the CMB; the large-scale diagonal feature (the so-called dipole) is caused by the motion of the Sun with respect to the CMB; and the faint horizontal
smudge is due to emission from the Milky Way. The bottom map results when these two components are removed. What is left is residual galactic emission (seen as a bright horizontal band), and a background of hot and cold spots, due largely to a mixture of instrument noise and the CMB.