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The Second ESA-CAS Joint Scientific Space Mission Workshop, jointly organized by the Directorate of Science and Robotic Exploration, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the National Space Science Center (NSSC), the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), was held in Copenhagen, Denmark, on Sept. 23-25, 2014.

Peter Sloth, the Head of Division of Research Infrastructure from Denmark Ministry of Higher Education and Science, delivered the welcome speech and introduced Denmark's involvement with space science activities. Alvaro Gimenez, ESA Director of Science and Robotic Exploration, pointed out that " the success of this small mission will bring us to bigger missions” and emphasized the importance of this "bottom up approach”. WU Ji, Director General of the National Space Science Center, expressed his expectation of good proposals with significant science impact in his welcome remarks.

Frederic Safa, Head of Science Operations Division, ESA, made an overall technical introduction. There were altogether 14 presentations and 6 posters proposed by teams from Europe and China. The presentation was made by the Co-PIs from Europe and China and they jointly answered the questions shortly after the presentation. The presenters introduced the joint team and attached great importance to the innovative mission concepts and the technical feasibility of the joint mission.

At the closing ceremony, Fabio Favata, the Head of the Science Coordination Office of Science and Robotic Exploration Directorate from ESA, remarked that the joint mission will be "a new chapter in space science we write together". Wu Ji stressed the importance of the scientific return of the joint mission both in terms of quality and quantity to promote significant science output. He also stressed that the mission should be proposed based on joint effort and beneficial to space science communities from both sides.

The workshop attracted over 50 scientists from European space research institutes in France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland, UK etc. and over 20 scientists from Chinese space institutes including National Space Science Center, the National Astronomical Observatories, Purple Mountain Observatory, Shanghai Astronomical Observatory, Institute of High Energy Physics, Institute of Mechanics, Institute of Mathematics, Tsinghua University, Beihang University and Beijing Satellite Navigation Center.

On the 9th ESA-China Space Science Bilateral Meeting held in May 2013, ESA and CAS entered the agreement to issue a joint call for a joint mission. To prepare the release of the joint call, the first CAS-ESA Joint Scientific Space Mission Workshop was held successfully in Feb. 2014 in Chengdu. The joint call will be released at the end of 2014 or early 2015.

　　Image 1: WU JI at the Opening Ceremony (Image by NSSC)

　　Image 2: Alvaro Gimenez ---“From Small Missions to Big Missions”(Image by NSSC)