Herschel Space Observatory is the European Space Agency's fourth "Cornerstone Mission". NASA is a partner in the Herschel mission, and the NASA Herschel Science Center is located at IPAC.

The Spitzer Space Telescope (formerly SIRTF), the infrared component of NASA's series of Great Observatories, was launched on August 25, 2003. The Spitzer Science Center is located within IPAC, and the Spitzer Heritage Archive is hosted by IRSA.

As an ESA-led mission with potential participation from NASA, Euclid will map the geometry of the dark Universe.

The Galaxy Evolution Explorer is a NASA Small Explorer mission designed to provide broadband imaging and spectroscopy at ultraviolet wavelengths. IPAC consulted in the development of the data processing system for GALEX.

For ten months in 1983, the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) scanned more than 96 percent of the sky. IRAS was a joint project of the US, UK and the Netherlands. The IRAS mission performed an unbiased, sensitive all sky survey at 12, 25, 60 and 100 µm. IPAC was founded to support IRAS, and currently the IRAS archive of catalogs, images tools and documentation is held in the IRSA archive at IPAC.

The Infrared Telescope in Space (IRTS) is a cryogenically cooled, small infrared telescope that flew from March - April in 1995. It surveyed approximately 10% of the sky with a relatively wide beam during its 20 day mission.

Kepler is NASA's first mission capable of finding Earth-size planets around other stars. Within IPAC, NExScI developed, hosts and operates the Kepler Science Analysis System (KSAS).

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) is a proposed ground-based 8.4-meter, 10 square-degree-field telescope that will provide digital imaging of faint astronomical objects across the entire sky, night after night. IPAC as part of Caltech is an institutional member of the project, and is developing the web-based Science User Interface, providing the immediate portal for astronomers and the public to the data collected by the LSST on nightly, yearly, and survey-long bases.

The Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX), a BMDO-sponsored military satellite, was launched in April 1996. Collaborative efforts between the Air Force Research Laboratory and IPAC has resulted in an archive containing images for about 15 percent of the sky, including the entire Galactic Plane, the Large Magellanic Cloud, and regions of the sky missed by IRAS. The MSX data archive is hosted by IRSA at IPAC.

The Near-Earth Object Camera (NEOCam) is a new mission proposal designed to discover and characterize most of the potentially hazardous asteroids that are near the Earth. NEOCam consists of an infrared telescope and a wide-field camera operating at thermal infrared wavelengths. The NEOCam proposal has recently been funded by NASA for technology development.

The Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) is a fully-automated, wide-field survey aimed at a systematic exploration of the optical transient sky. The program is centered on a 12Kx8K, 7.8 square degree CCD array (CFH12K) re-engineered for the 1.2-m Oschin Telescope at Palomar Observatory.

The Spitzer Space Telescope (formerly SIRTF), the infrared component of NASA's series of Great Observatories, was launched on August 25, 2003. The Spitzer Science Center is located within IPAC, and the Spitzer Heritage Archive is hosted by IRSA.

The Two Micron All-Sky Survey (2MASS) is a near-infrared digital imaging survey of the entire sky conducted by the University of Massachusetts and IPAC at 1.25, 1.65 and 2.17 microns. IPAC was responsible for all data processing through the Production Pipeline, and construction and distribution of the data products.

The Wide-field Infrared Explorer (WIRE) was a NASA Small Explorer mission. IPAC provided science operations and data analysis for WIRE.

Proposed for launch in 2017 as part of NASA's Explorers Program, FINESSE would take the first "family portrait" of extrasolar planets, or exoplanets. FINESSE is the first mission dedicated to finding out what exoplanet atmospheres are made of, what conditions or processes are responsible for their composition, and how our own solar system fits into the larger family of planets.

Herschel Space Observatory is the European Space Agency's fourth "Cornerstone Mission". NASA is a partner in the Herschel mission, and the NASA Herschel Science Center is located at IPAC.

The Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) was launched by ESA in late 1995 and operated for 30 months before the cryogen was exhausted. IPAC's role included improving data pipelines and specialized software analysis tools to yield the best quality calibration and data reduction methods from the mission. IPAC also supported ISO observers and data archive users through in-house visits and workshops, and developed IRSA's ISO visualizer.

The Keck Interferometer (KI) unites the twin 10-meter Keck Telescopes in Hawaii to create the largest optical/near-infrared interferometer in the world, equivalent to a single 85-m diameter telescope with a spatial resolution of 5 milliarcseconds in the near-IR. The NASA Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI) at IPAC is responsible for developing and operating the Science Operations System for KI.

The Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer, or LBTI, is a ground-based instrument connecting two 8-meter class telescopes on Mount Graham in Arizona to form the largest single-mount telescope in the world.

LCOGT is a privately funded observatory building a global network of more than 30 2-meter, 1-meter, and 0.4-meter telescopes.

The NASA Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI) provides tools and archives for the exoplanet community, administers the Sagan program of fellowships and workshops, supports the Keck Interferometer and Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer. NExScI provides administration of NASA Keck telescope time, and additional projects in the Exoplanet Exploration Program.

The Palomar Testbed Interferometer (PTI) was a near-infrared stellar interferometer located at Palomar Observatory and operated by JPL. PTI operated as a science facility by the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI) at IPAC.

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 US Planck Data Center is located at IPAC, and IPAC generated the Early Release Compact Source Catalog (ERCSC), the first public data product from the mission.

TMT is a telescope under development with a 30-meter, filled aperture primary mirror composed of 492 x 1.46-meter segments. Instruments and an adaptive optics (AO) system will be housed on two large, stable Nasmyth platforms. TMT is ready to enter the Construction Phase at the Mauna Kea site in April 2014.

The Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) is the top-ranked large space mission from the Astro2010 Decadal Survey. NASA is conducting a formulation phase study of a design reference mission that would be capable of addressing essential questions in the areas of exoplanets, dark energy, and infrared astrophysics.

The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) provides an all-sky survey from 3 to 25 microns which is up to 500 times more sensitive than the previous infrared all-sky survey from IRAS survey. WISE launched on 14 December 2009. The Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC) is responsible for data processing and archiving, and preparing images for public release into the image gallery.