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Multimedia Gallery

  • Artist concept of the Voyager spacecraft

    Voyager

    Launches: August 20 and September 5, 1977
    Voyager 1 and 2 flew by Jupiter and Saturn, and Voyager 2 also visited Uranus and Neptune. Both craft are now heading out of our solar system. Voyager 1 is the most distant human-made object in space.

  • Artist concept of the Ulysses solar polar mission

    Ulysses

    Launch: October 6, 1990
    A joint NASA/European Space Agency mission, Ulysses for the first time sent a spacecraft out of the the plane in which Earth and other planets orbit the Sun in order to study the Sun's poles. Ulysses continues to monitor the Sun.

  • Astronauts installing the Wide Field and Planetary Camera on the Hubble Space Telescope

    Wide Field Planetary Camera 2

    Launches: April 24, 1990; December 2, 1993
    These two instruments served as the main camera capturing pictures on NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

  • Cassini Spacecraft

    Cassini-Huygens

    Launch: October 15, 1997
    A joint endeavor of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency, Cassini is conducting an intensive study of Saturn's rings, its moons and magnetosphere.

  • Artist concept of the Stardust spacecraft

    Stardust

    Launch: February 7, 1999
    Stardust successfully flew through the cloud of dust that surrounds the nucleus of comet Wild-2 and gathered a sample of cometary material.

  • Artist concept of the Quick Scatterometer or QuickScat

    Quick Scatterometer

    Launch: June 19, 1999
    This ocean-observing satellite carries an instrument called a scatterometer, which sends radar pulses to the ocean surface and measures the "backscattered" or echoed radar pulses bounced back to the satellite.

  • Artist concept of the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer

    Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer

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

  • Artist concept of the Multi

    Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer

    Launch: December 18, 1999
    Carried onboard NASA's Terra satellite, this imaging system collects images from nine widely spaced angles as it glides above Earth.

  • Artist concept of the Active Cavity Irradiance Monitor Satellite

    Active Cavity Irradiance Monitor Satellite

    Launch: December 22, 1999
    This satellite is designed to monitor the total amount of the Sun's energy reaching Earth.

  • The Keck Interferometer

    Keck Interferometer

    First light: March 2001
    The Keck Interferometer links two 10-meter (33-foot) telescopes, forming the world's most powerful optical telescope system.

  • Artist concept of the Mars Odyssey spacecraft over mars

    Mars Odyssey

    Launch: April 7, 2001
    Odyssey is an orbiting spacecraft designed to determine the makeup of the martian surface, to detect water and shallow buried ice, and to study the radiation environment.

  • Artist concept of the Jason 1 spacecraft in orbit

    Jason 1

    Launch: December 7, 2001
    This oceanography mission is a follow-up to Topex/Poseidon and will monitor global ocean circulation and monitor events such as El Niño.

  • Artist concept of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiement

    Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment

    Launch: Mar. 17, 2002
    This joint U.S.-German mission consists of two spacecraft flying in tandem to measure Earth's gravitational field very precisely.

  • Artist concept of the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder

    Atmospheric Infrared Sounder

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

  • Artist concept of the Galaxy Evolution Explorer spacecraft

    Galaxy Evolution Explorer

    Launch: Apr. 28, 2003
    This mission uses ultraviolet wavelengths to measure the history of star formation.

  • Artist concept of a Mars Exploration Rover

    Mars Exploration Rovers

    First rover launch: June 10, 2003. Second rover launch: July 7, 2003
    Two rovers, working on opposite sides of Mars, successfully completed their primary mission in April 2004. As of November 2004, both rovers are now in extended missions.

  • Artist concept of the Spitzer Space Telescope

    Spitzer Space Telescope

    Launch: August 25, 2003, ET (August 24 PT)
    Formerly known as the Space Infrared Telescope Facility, Spitzer is using infrared technology to study celestial objects that are hidden from view. The mission is part of NASA's Great Observatories Program.

  • Artist depiction of the Microwave Instrument on the Rosetta Orbiter

    Microwave Instrument on the Rosetta Orbiter

    Launch: March 2, 2004
    The European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft will rendezvous with a comet in 2014. JPL's microwave instrument onboard Rosetta will study gases given off by the comet.

  • Artist concept of the Microwave Limb Sounder

    Microwave Limb Sounder

    Launch: July 15, 2004
    This instrument, which flies aboard NASA's Aura spacecraft, is designed to improve our understanding of ozone.

  • Workers install the Troposphereic Emission Spectrometer

    Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer

    Launch: July 15, 2004
    This instrument onboard NASA's Aura spacecraft is an infrared sensor designed to study Earth's troposphere and look at ozone.

  • Artist concept of the Deep Impact spacecraft

    Deep Impact

    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. The spacecraft is now on a trajectory to fly past Earth in December 2007.

  • Aritst concept of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

    Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

    Launch: August 12, 2005
    NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter will take the most powerful telescopic camera ever to another planet, plus five other scientific instruments.

  • CloudSat Spacecraft

    CloudSat

    Launch: Apr. 28, 2006
    CloudSat is the first spacecraft to study clouds on a global basis.

Mission Information

    Future Missions
    Learn about JPL's missions scheduled to launch in the future.
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    Proposed Missions
    Find out what missions are in the proposal stage.
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    Past Missions
    Find out about JPL's historic missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
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