THEMIS Mission

Artist's concept of the THEMIS spacecraft as it might appear in orbit. Credit: NASA

Learn about ARTEMIS' predecessor

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› ARTEMIS Mission Space Science Review Paper

Artist concept of space weather showing an active Sun with flares and a CME in the upper right, the Earth in the lower right with types of technology affected by space weather to the lower left; satellites, airplanes, the ISS and ground-based electrical lines.
Heliophysics

Studying the Sun-Earth connection.

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Latest from Artemis

ARTEMIS P2 Joins P1 in Lunar Orbit. This image shows lunar orbit insertion as the incoming red trajectory.

Second ARTEMIS Spacecraft Successfully Enters Lunar ...

The second of the two ARTEMIS spacecraft entered lunar orbit Sunday morning.

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Screen capture from simulation of ARTEMIS P1 spacecraft entering lunar orbit.

First ARTEMIS Spacecraft Successfully Enters Lunar ...

The first of the two ARTEMIS spacecraft entered lunar orbit this morning. ARTEMIS was the first mission to orbit the moon's Lagrangian points and ...

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Diagram of ARTEMIS spacecraft maneuvers to transition from Lissajous orbits on each side of the moon to lunar orbit.

ARTEMIS Spacecraft Prepare for Lunar Orbit

It took one and a half years, over 90 orbit maneuvers, many gravitational boosts and little fuel to move two spacecraft from their orbits around ...

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Artist's concept of the THEMIS spacecraft as it might appear in orbit. Credit: NASA

Dead Spacecraft Walking

Because they lie just outside Earth's magnetosphere, Lagrange points are excellent places to study the solar wind.

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An artist's concept of the ARTEMIS spacecraft in orbit around the Moon.

ARTEMIS Spacecraft Believed Struck by Object

Flight Dynamics data from THEMIS-B (one of the two ARTEMIS spacecraft) indicated that one of the electric field instrument spherical tip masses may ...

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The ARTEMIS spacecraft are currently located at the L1 and L2 Earth-Moon Lagrange points.

ARTEMIS - The First Earth-Moon Libration Orbiter

NASA has achieved another first by placing the ARTEMIS-P1 spacecraft into a unique orbit behind the moon, but not actually orbiting the moon itself.

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Press Releases

  • Two NASA Probes Tackle New Mission: Studying the Moon

    07.19.11 - A NASA led team of scientists and engineers has repositioned two small probes from Earth’s orbit where they studied space weather to begin orbiting the moon to study its interior and surface composition.

Mission Overview

    ARTEMIS stands for “Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of the Moon’s Interaction with the Sun”.

    The ARTEMIS mission uses two of the five in-orbit spacecraft from another NASA Heliophysics constellation of satellites, THEMIS, that were launched in 2007 and successfully completed their mission earlier in 2010. The ARTEMIS mission allowed NASA to repurpose two in-orbit spacecraft to extend their useful science mission.

Image Gallery

THEMIS Spawns ARTEMIS

Graphic of the Earth and its magnetosphere and the five Themis spacecraft within Earth's magnetotail, showing the two now-designated Artemis craft orbiting the Moon.
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