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Video: 00:09:13

Meet Andrea Patassa—test pilot, aviator, passionate outdoor adventurer, and Member of ESA’s Astronaut Reserve. 

In this miniseries, we take you on a journey through the ESA Astronaut Reserve, diving into the first part of their Astronaut Reserve Training (ART) at the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) near Cologne, Germany. Our “ARTists” are immersing themselves in everything from ESA and the International Space Station programme to the European space industry and institutions. They’re gaining hands-on experience in technical skills like spacecraft systems and robotics, alongside human behaviour, scientific lessons, scuba diving, and survival training. 

ESA’s Astronaut Reserve Training programme is all about building Europe’s next generation of space explorers—preparing them for the opportunities of future missions in Earth orbit and beyond. 

This interview was recorded in November 2024. 

You can also listen to this episode on all major podcast platforms. 

Keep exploring with ESA Explores! 

The emission nebula, known as Sh2-284, is an immense region of gas and dust that fuels new star formation. It lacks elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, much like the environment of the early universe.

Image: Inner space engineering

Isar Aerospace is preparing to launch its Spectrum rocket from a base in Norway, which would make it the first orbital launch from continental Europe outside Russia

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Tololo Totality

President Donald Trump is threatening steep tariffs on virtually all imports. Here’s what that means and what economics research suggests would be the impact

Stone tools are considered the first form of technology devised by ancient humans – but they might not have been invented from scratch

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2 min read

Hubble Captures a Neighbor’s Colorful Clouds This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features part of the Small Magellanic Cloud. ESA/Hubble & NASA, C. Murray
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Say hello to one of the Milky Way’s neighbors! This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a scene from one of the closest galaxies to the Milky Way, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). The SMC is a dwarf galaxy located about 200,000 light-years away. Most of the galaxy resides in the constellation Tucana, but a small section crosses over into the neighboring constellation Hydrus.

Thanks to its proximity, the SMC is one of only a few galaxies that are visible from Earth without the help of a telescope or binoculars. For viewers in the southern hemisphere and some latitudes in the northern hemisphere, the SMC resembles a piece of the Milky Way that has broken off, though in reality it’s much farther away than any part of our own galaxy.

With its 2.4-meter mirror and sensitive instruments, Hubble’s view of the SMC is far more detailed and vivid than what humans can see. Researchers used Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 to observe this scene through four different filters. Each filter permits different wavelengths of light, creating a multicolored view of dust clouds drifting across a field of stars. Hubble’s view, however, is much more zoomed-in than our eyes, allowing it to observe very distant objects. This image captures a small region of the SMC near the center of NGC 346, a star cluster that is home to dozens of massive young stars.

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Media Contact:

Claire Andreoli (claire.andreoli@nasa.gov)
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD

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Last Updated

Mar 21, 2025

Editor Andrea Gianopoulos Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

Related Terms

• Hubble Space Telescope
• Astrophysics
• Astrophysics Division
• Galaxies
• Goddard Space Flight Center
• Magellanic Clouds
• The Universe

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