Missions in Development

Herschel: The Herschel Space Observatory is the European Space Agency's fourth "Cornerstone Mission". The 3.5 meter telescope will perform photometry and spectroscopy in approximately the 55-672 micron range. It is designed to observe the Far-infrared and Submillimeter Universe and has the potential of discovering the earliest epoch proto-galaxies, revealing cosmologically evolving AGN/starburst symbiosis, and unravelling the mechanisms governing the formation of stars and planetary systems, such as our own. Herschel is planned as a three year observatory mission, with a launch date planned for 2008. NASA is a partner in the Herschel Mission, with US participants contributing to the mission; providing mission-enabling instrument technology and sponsoring the NASA Herschel Science Center at IPAC (the NHSC). The NHSC is established to provide the US astronomical community with science and observational support throughout all phases of the Herschel Mission.

Planck: Scheduled for launch in 2008, Planck will help provide answers to one of the most important sets of questions asked in modern science - how did the Universe begin, how did it evolve to the state we observe today, and how will it continue to evolve in the future? Planck's objective is to analyze, with the highest accuracy ever achieved, the remnants of the radiation that filled the Universe immediately after the Big Bang, which we observe today as the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). The Planck mission will collect and characterize radiation from the CMB using sensitive radio receivers operating at extremely low temperatures. These receivers will determine the black body equivalent temperature of the background radiation and will be capable of distinguishing temperature variations of about one microkelvin. These measurements will be used to produce the best ever maps of aniosotopies in the CMB radiation field.

WISE: The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer will provide an all-sky survey from 3 to 25 microns which will be up to 500 times more sensitive than the IRAS survey. WISE will find the most luminous galaxies in the Universe, the closest stars to the Sun, detect most main belt asteroids larger than 3 km, and extend the 2MASS survey into the thermal infrared. WISE will also enable a wide variety of studies ranging from the evolution of protoplanetary debris discs to the history of star formation in normal galaxies. The survey will help search for the origins of planets, stars, and galaxies and create an infrared atlas whose legacy will endure for decades.

Operational Missions

Proposed Missions

Past Missions