Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration (IMAGE)

Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration (IMAGE) is the name of NASA Medium Explorers mission launched in 2000 to study the global response of the Earth’s magnetosphere to changes in the solar wind.

In 2005, after 5 1/2 years of successful operations, the satellite stopped communicating for unknown reasons.

It had fulfilled the parameters of its mission and provided astrophysicists with a wealth of data on the magnetosphere, the region of space controlled by the planet’s magnetic field and the host to plasmas that can’t easily be seen by Earth-bound instruments.