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UCL in the News: The satellite that set alight science

4 May 2007

Fifty years ago this October a Soviet engineer launched the rocket that put 184lbs of metal and electronics high into orbit.

UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory scientists now have satellite instruments staring at the sun, Venus, Mars and Saturn. "For the first time, we are peering underneath the haze of Titan, using infrared and ultraviolet to see through the organic smog," says Dr Andrew Coates, of the UCL Mullard lab. "We are going to Mars. We are going to be taking the next European pictures of the Martian surface. We are dreaming of new missions to places that haven't been explored yet, like Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter, which has an icy surface and a liquid water ocean underneath. And then there is also another possible mission to look at Titan again, and another Saturn moon - Enceladus - which we have recently found has liquid water underneath its surface. Apart from Earth, Europa and Enceladus are the only places where we know there is liquid water." …

Tim Radford, 'The Guardian'