The Secure and cryptographic (Saga) mission is the European Space Agency’s (ESA) initiative to enable highly secure cryptographic key distribution from space using Quantum Key Distribution (QKD). As cyber threats continue to evolve, the technologies developed and demonstrated under Saga are designed to strengthen Europe’s digital resilience and strategic autonomy by supporting highly secure communications.

Satellite imagery can show when a crime leaves a mark on the landscape – a village destroyed, a lake drained, a forest cleared. However, whether a court will accept satellite evidence remains an open question. The 'Earth Observation for Human Rights and Legal Accountability Mechanisms' project, co-funded by the Discovery element of ESA's Basic Activities and the Centre for Sustainable Development at the University of Strathclyde, examined how Earth observation data can be systematically analysed and presented to meet the evidentiary standards required in legal proceedings.

Using the unprecedented imaging and spectroscopic power of the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, researchers have mapped the motion and composition of gas orbiting a black hole in the centre of Abell2744-QSO1, a tiny galaxy more than 13 billion light-years away. The results suggest that the 50-million-solar-mass black hole predates its host galaxy, possibly forming within the first second of the Big Bang, and must have been immense from the start.

The launch of the 4DSpace-Daedalus mission in Norway is the latest success supported by Prodex, a European Space Agency (ESA) programme which enables highly skilled research institutes to partake in European space science activities and missions.