Question: What do you send instruments into space for? What benefit do they have?

Darren Yau answered on 23 Sep 2022:

Hi there

Over the years we’ve sent a number of things into space to help us learn about the world and universe around us. Currently we use satellites to help with things like weather and our water systems to help farming/agriculture.

Although unsuccessful, Beagle 2 was designed to search for signs of life on Mars. At the same time, I worked on Rosetta, which was a 10-year comet chasing mission designed to study the origin of comets.

I worked on these projects about 20 years ago but since then, I’ve been involved in other missions that have studied the Earth’s magnetic field to help scientists understand more about our planet. Also, I’m involved with a mission to send a telescope into space for mapping our treescape. This will help us assess our environment for forestry and understand the effects of climate change.

Currently I’m involved in two Lunar missions that will help us study the water cycle. This may provide valuable information that will help with future missions and exploration.