XMM Newton has gone into orbit!
XMM Newton was launched succesfully into orbit at 14.32 GMT from the European Space Agency's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on Friday 10th December! Pictures of XMM Newton in space are available from the ESA news reports - artist's impressions and other images are also available. Major developments will be posted here.

1st July 2000 Calibration and Performance Verification phase comes to a close and Guaranteed Time observations begin

17th April 2000 XMM-Newton seen high over Europe Report from ESA on telescope sightings of the satellite over Europe

2nd February 2000 First light images from XMM-Newton can be seen on the UK XMM-Newton Information Centre pages.

1st February 2000 A movie of the XMM Newton launch can be seen at the ArianeSpace web site

19th January 2000 See XMM Newton flying through the stars! An image of XMM Newton orbiting the Earth taken from Australia.

7th January 2000 XMM Newton commissioning begins Engineering tests of the instruments on board XMM Newton began on the 4th January, and first tests showed that all remain in the same condition as before launch. `First light' - the first official images from the XMM Newton observatory, are available now from the UK XMM Newton Information Centre and from the European Space Agency!

4th January 2000 XMM Newton First Cycle - approved Guest Observer programme

20th December 1999 XMM Newton flying beautifully - the latest press release from the European Space Agency

MSSL has a major involvement in the European Space Agency's cornerstone mission, the X-ray Multi-mirror Mission (XMM). It provides X-ray images and spectra, reaching sensitivity levels at least 10 times fainter than the best previous X-ray telescopes, and will revolutionise our knowledge of the X-ray Universe.

MSSL is the Principal Investigator institute for the Optical Monitor on XMM, and Co-Investigator on the Reflection Grating Spectrometer and the Survey Science Centre.

For more information about the mission, its instrumentation and its scientific objectives, please visit the links below.

The UK XMM Newton Information Centre on the WWW is now open, providing resources and guidance to prospective XMM Newton observers directly from the UK instrument teams, and information about the ESA XMM Newton observatory for members of the public.

The Survey Science Centre's database for the X-ray identification programme (XID-DB) The database of serendipitous X-ray sources and their optical counterparts, will be maintained here at MSSL