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BRITAIN is to spend Pounds sterling 17 million on instruments for two
new astronomical satellites. The new funding, announced last week by Britain’s
Science and Engineering Research Council, is for an X-ray satellite being
developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) and an ultraviolet satellite
that is the result of a collaboration between Britain, Canada and the US.

According to Len Culhane, chairman of the space science programme board
of the SERC and the British National Space Centre, the decision ‘puts British
space science back on track, after some difficulties in late 1987′. That
was when the government rejected the BNSC’s recommendation to increase spending
on space science.

Culhane says the money is not new, but comes from the SERC’s existing
astronomy research budget. At present, Britain’s spending on space per year
amounts to Pounds sterling 24 million as a straight fee to the ESA and Pounds
sterling 12 million for ‘national programmes,’ including instruments for
ESA satellites.

The X-ray multi-mirror satellite, XMM, is one of the European Space
Agency’s main ventures. The agency intends to spend around Pounds sterling
250 million on each of four ‘cornerstone’ projects over the next 10 years.