ESA Publications Brochures

Presenting an overall impression of our agency's achievements, this book charts the ripples of 'The ESA Effect' on a variety of scales, from surveying the verges of space and time to probing our own Solar System, satellite systems for communications, meteorology, navigation and Earth observation to humankind's own orbital bridgehead, the launchers and ground stations that link Europe to space, and the steady stream of new technologies that bring space closer, and offer spin-off opportunities in everyday life.

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ESA’s Huygens probe was a passenger on NASA’s Cassini mission to Saturn. The probe’s mission was to to explore the physical properties and atmosphere of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, by descending through the atmosphere and landing on its surface. The probe was named for Christiaan Huygens, who discovered the moon in 1655.Launched in October 1997, the mission arrived at Saturn in 2004. In anticipation of this, ESA organised a conference ‘Titan, from Discovery to Encounter’ in April 2004, for historians and scientists. At the same time, four museums in the region where Christiaan Huygens lived and made his observations held related exhibitions under the umbrella title ‘Christiaan Huygens, Facets of a genius’. This brochure contains four essays, each relating to one of the exhibitions.A larger collection of essays may be found in the conference proceedings: SP-1278.Read online in English or Dutch

Satellites are designed to perform specific functions in space, in telecommunications, meteorology, observation of the Earth, microgravity, solar system science or space astronomy. It is the responsibility of ESA's European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany, to ensure that the objectives of each of the different missions are attained. This 2001 brochure describes the process of preparation and execution of satellite mission operations as exercised at ESOC, to provide insight into how such things are done.Read online in English, French and German