Third from the Sun Notebook

ESA plays a major role in pushing the boundaries of Solar System science. Solar Orbiter, an ESA-led mission, was launched in 2020 and will further our understanding of our Sun, the heliosphere and space weather. ESA has already sent spacecraft to Earth’s nearest planetary neighbours, Mars and Venus. In the next decade the BepiColombo spacecraft will reach Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun and one of the least explored in the Solar System. The gas giants Saturn and Jupiter are also a key piece of the Solar System’s evolution. The Cassini-Huygens mission visited Saturn’s moon in 2005, while the Juice mission is scheduled to visit Jupiter and its moons in the next decade. As more is known about the exoplanets orbiting other stars, understanding our own cosmic neighbourhood and our home planet has never been so important, also for future generations.

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