Launch: December 20,1999  
This satellite is designed to monitor the total amount of the Sun's energy reaching Earth. These data will help climatologists improve their predictions of climate change and global warming over the next century.

› Overview

› Satellite home page

Launch: December 18,1999  
This imaging instrument flying on NASA's Terra satellite is designed to obtain high-resolution global, regional and local views of Earth in 14 color bands.

› Overview

› Instrument home page

Aquarius

Launch: June 9, 2011
   This mission will provide the first-ever global maps of salt concentrations in the ocean surface needed to understand heat transport and storage in the ocean.

› Mission home page

Launch: May 4, 2002  
This instrument flies aboard NASA's Aqua satellite to make highly accurate measurements of air temperature, humidity, clouds and surface temperatures.

› Overview

› Instrument home page

Launch: October 15,1997  
A joint endeavor of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency, Cassini arrived at Saturn in June 2004 carrying a record number of 12 instruments. The mission is an intensive study of Saturn's rings, its moons and magnetosphere. Cassini released the Huygens probe towards Saturn's largest moon, Titan and the probe successfully landed on the moon's surface in January 2005.

› Overview

› Cassini home page

Launch: April 28, 2006  
CloudSat is the first satellite that uses an advanced radar to "slice" through clouds to see their vertical structure. Their data will contribute to better predictions of clouds and their role in climate change.

› Overview
CloudSat home page

Launch: September 27, 2007  
Dawn, the first spacecraft ever planned to orbit two different bodies after leaving Earth, will orbit Vesta and Ceres, two of the largest asteroids in the solar system.

› Overview

› Dawn home page

Launch: January 12, 2005  
Deep Impact traveled to comet Tempel 1 and deployed an impactor that was essentially "run over" by the nucleus of Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005.

› Overview

› Deep Impact home page

Launch: October 24, 1998  
Unlike missions focused on science investigations, Deep Space 1 was a spacecraft designed to flight-test new technologies -- including an ion engine that could power solar system explorers of the future. With its primary mission successfully completed, the craft went on an extended mission and flew by comet Borrelly in September 2001, taking the best pictures ever of a comet's nucleus.

› Overview

› Deep Space 1 home page

Deformation, Ecosystem Structure and Dynamics of ICE

Proposed Launch: October 2017  
A dedicated U.S. mission using the combined advanced radar technologies of Interferometric Synthetic Aperture and Light Detection and Ranging, optimized for studying hazards and global environmental change.

› Mission home page

Launch: January 12, 2005  
The EPOXI mission recycled the already "in flight" Deep Impact spacecraft to investigate two distinct celestial targets of opportunity. In 2008, Epoxi observed five nearby stars with "transiting extrasolar planets," and later, on Nov. 4, 2010, the spacecraft flew by and investigated comet Hartley 2.

› Overview

› EPOXI home page

Launch: January-August, 1958  
Explorer 1 became the first satellite launched by the United States on January 31, 1958. Its main payload was a cosmic ray detector which discovered the Van Allen Radiation Belts. It was followed by four similar satellites, two of which were successful.

› Overview

› Explorer 1 home page

Launch: April 28, 2003  
This mission uses ultraviolet wavelengths to measure the history of star formation 80 percent of the way back to the Big Bang.

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› Galex home page

Launch: October 18, 1989  
Upon arrival at Jupiter in December 1995, the Galileo spacecraft delivered a probe that descended into the giant planet's atmosphere. The orbiter then completed many flybys of Jupiter's major moons, reaping a variety of science discoveries. The mission ended on Sept. 21, 2003 when the spacecraft plunged into Jupiter's atmosphere.

› Overview

› Galileo home page

Launch: August 8, 2001  
Genesis collected samples of charged particles in the solar wind and returned them to Earth in September 2004. Although the capsule's parachutes did not deploy, scientists expect to be able to achieve most of their science objectives with samples recovered from the capsule.

› Overview

› Genesis home page

Launch: March 17, 2002  
This joint U.S.-German mission consists of two spacecraft flying in tandem to measure Earth's gravitational field very precisely. This will enable a better understanding of ocean surface currents and ocean heat transport.

› Overview

› Grace home page

Launch: September 8, 2011  
The Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory, or GRAIL, mission will fly twin spacecraft in tandem orbits around the moon for three months to measure its gravity field in unprecedented detail.
› Overview

› Mission site

Launch: May 9, 2003  
On June 13, 2010, the Japanese Hayabusa spacecraft completed a seven-year mission when it returned a sample capsule containing particles from asteroid Itokawa.

› Overview

› Hayabusa website

Herschel Space Observatory

Launch: May 14, 2009  
The Herschel Space Observatory is a space-based telescope that will study the universe by the light of the far-infrared and submillimeter portions of the spectrum. JPL is making significant contributions to instruments on this European Space Agency mission.

› JPL's Herschel site
› NASA's Herschel site

Launch: January 25, 1983  
This satellite put an infrared telescope in orbit above the interference of Earth's atmosphere. The mission provided many unexpected findings, including the discovery of solid material around the stars Vega and Fomalhaut.

› Overview