UK-backed space mission launches early 2027 to hunt Earth-like planets
Key Points
- ESA's PLATO telescope is scheduled to launch in early 2027 for a 4.5-year mission
- 26 cameras will monitor hundreds of thousands of stars for planetary transits
- The mission targets rocky planets in the habitable zones of Sun-like stars
- Warwick, UCL, Cambridge and Birmingham hold lead roles in science and hardware
- Teledyne e2v in Chelmsford is building the CCD detectors under ESA contract
The European Space Agency’s PLATO telescope is scheduled to launch in early 2027 with 26 cameras built to find rocky planets in the habitable zones of Sun-like stars, according to the UK Space Agency.
PLATO, short for PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars, is the third medium-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision programme. The UK Space Agency updated its mission page on Wednesday (2 September), confirming the early 2027 launch date and a nominal mission length of 4.5 years.
The telescope carries 24 “normal” cameras and two “fast” cameras that will stare at hundreds of thousands of stars for several years without interruption. The cameras look for tiny dips in starlight caused by planets passing in front of their host stars, the agency said.
PLATO is designed to measure planetary radii and the radii, masses and ages of the stars they orbit, along with the amount of stellar radiation each planet receives. Combined with ground-based observations, the mission will also produce planetary masses and mean densities, which reveal whether a planet is rocky, icy or gaseous.
The mission’s second job is to study seismic activity inside stars, which allows scientists to work out how old planet-hosting stars are. That in turn shows how planetary systems change over time.
ESA has set the mission three overarching questions: how planets and planetary systems form and evolve, whether the Solar System is unusual, and whether potentially habitable planets exist elsewhere. PLATO will also identify targets for follow-up observations by other telescopes to study planetary atmospheres.
UK role in the mission
Don Pollacco, Professor at the University of Warwick, leads the PLATO Science Management team, heads the mission’s exoplanet science programme and sits on the PLATO Consortium Board.
UCL’s Mullard Space Science Laboratory led the design and build of the electronics for the 24 normal cameras.
Teledyne e2v in Chelmsford is manufacturing the CCD detectors under contract to ESA. The University of Cambridge heads the UK arm of the PLATO Data Centre and leads development of the data processing pipelines for exoplanet science, while the University of Birmingham is responsible for part of the stellar science programme.
The Open University, the University of Oxford, the University of St Andrews and Keele University are also contributing to science management and data centre work. Thales Alenia Space UK worked on avionics development and service module integration as a partner to prime contractor OHB, which is building the spacecraft platform.
The agency said holding the science leadership role would secure the maximum return on UK investment from the mission’s data and help the UK maintain its
