In 1957 Roscosmos, the Russian space exploration agency, launched Sputnik 1 into outer space heralding the beginning of a new era in human existence. Since that time thousands of spacecrafts have been launched into space. Some were spectacular successes, other not so much.

Today there are an estimated 50 active space crafts floating around our solar system. The majority of them are involved in research activities. Here are some of the more prominent names and a description of what they are doing.

The Hubble Space Telescope is orbiting Earth. It has spent the last 26 years observing the visible universe. The images form this telescope have been responsible for considerable understanding of the formation process and the current state of our solar system and galaxy.

The SOHO or Solar and Heliospheric Observatory is studying the Sun’s outer layers as well as solar wind storms. It has provided invaluable data on the magnetic activity of the Sun and discovered 3000 sungrazer comets as they went past.

Kepler is perhaps the most famous space craft for discovering Earth like planets outside out Soalr system. Since it was launched in 2009 it has detected more than 2300 alien worlds that may be akin to Earth.

Needless to say science projects are continuously being conducted on these space crafts by their handler back in control rooms on Earth.