Next 50 years

Finding evidence that life exists elsewhere in the Universe heads an ambitious list of goals for scientists over the next 50 years.

Cosmic Vision

ESA's Cosmic Vision

The European Space Agency is currently selecting mission proposals for Cosmic Vision, its programme of space science missions for the period 2015-2025.

The missions must address the following questions:

What are the conditions for life and planetary formation?
How does the Solar System work?
What are the fundamental laws of the Universe?
How did the Universe begin and what is it made of?

Consortia of scientists from across ESA's member states, including the UK, have been working on detailed mission, which must be submitted by 29th June. From October, ESA's Space Science Advisory Council will spend 18 months assessing proposals and select three medium-scale missions (costing less than 300 million Euros) and three large-scale missions (costing up to 600 million Euros). In 2011, the final selections will be made for one medium-scale mission, due for launch in 2017, and one large-scale mission, due for launch in 2018.

Aurora

Aurora is the European Space Agency's long-term strategy for the exploration of our Solar System by robotic probes and astronauts, with Mars, the Moon and the asteroids as the most likely targets. Aurora's secondary objective is to search for life beyond the Earth.

The UK's scientific and industrial communities are playing a leading role in Aurora and are currently working on the development of ExoMars, a rover that will land on the surface of Mars and look for signs of past and present life. Exomars will be capable of autonomous navigation and will carry a drilling system to collect samples of rock from beneath the Martian surface and analyse their chemistry in a miniature laboratory to look for the chemical markers of life.

EADS Astrium, based at Stevenage in Hertfordshire, is currently carrying out tests with "Bridget", a prototype of the rover, in the laboratory and in Mars-like terrains of the Canary Islands. In addition to its £74.4 million investment in Aurora, the Science and Technology Facilities Council has committed a further £1.7 million for the development of instrumentation and technologies for the Pasteur instrument package that will be carried by ExoMars.