Q&A with Heino Falcke, principal investigator of the Netherlands-China Low-Frequency Explorer (members only)

NASA’s new planet-hunting TESS observatory completed its first post-launch thruster firing Saturday, setting up for a big boost Wednesday that will send the spacecraft toward the moon for a flyby next month, the next maneuvers in a two-month process to reach the mission’s final science orbit in mid-June.

The European Space Agency has cinched an agreement with Arianespace for the October 2018 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope aboard an Ariane 5 rocket, which will dispatch the nearly $10 billion observatory on a bold mission that promises to rewrite astronomy textbooks.

A joint oceanography research mission developed by Chinese and French scientists launched Monday on top of a Long March 2C rocket from the Jiuquan space center in remote northwestern China.