The European Space Agency's (ESA) Atomic Clock Ensemble in Space (ACES) has been successfully launched to the International Space Station (ISS), where it will usher in a new era of ultra-precise timekeeping from orbit. Carried aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9...
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The European Space Agency's (ESA) Atomic Clock Ensemble in Space (ACES) has been successfully launched to the International Space Station (ISS), where it will usher in a new era of ultra-precise timekeeping from orbit.
Carried aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, ACES lifted off today from Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center as part of the 32nd commercial resupply mission to the ISS. Once installed on the European Columbus module, ACES will become the most accurate timepiece ever sent into space—capable of losing just one second every 300 million years.
"The launch of ACES marks a major milestone for European science and international cooperation in space," said Daniel Neuenschwander, ESA's Director of Human and Robotic Exploration. "With this mission, we are placing the most precise timepiece ever sent to orbit aboard the International Space Station — opening new frontiers in fundamental physics, time transfer, and global synchronization."
Led by ESA and built in partnership with Airbus, ACES combines two state-of-the-art atomic clocks: PHARAO, developed by the French space agency CNES, and the Space Hydrogen Maser (SHM), built by Safran Timing Technologies in Switzerland. Together, they will generate an ultra-stable time signal for transmission back to Earth.
The mission also includes an advanced time transfer system, developed by TimeTech in Germany, which uses both microwave and laser links to synchronize time between space and ground stations with unprecedented precision. The goal: to connect the world's best atomic clocks and enable groundbreaking experiments in fundamental physics, including high-precision tests of Einstein's theory of general relativity.
ACES will be installed later this week—currently scheduled for April 25—by the ISS's robotic arm onto the nadir (Earth-facing) side of the Columbus module. Over the next 30 months, the mission will conduct at least ten long-duration measurement campaigns, each lasting 25 days, as the ISS orbits Earth 16 times a day.
Mission operations will be coordinated from the CADMOS facility in France and the Columbus Control Centre in Germany.
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