On May 25th, President Yamakawa of JAXA and Dr. Phillipe Baptiste, CEO of the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), the French Space Agency have signed Inter-Agency Agreement Concerning the Cooperation ㏌ the Field of Space Programmes at JAXA Sagamihara Campus. JAXA and CNES established long standing cooperation for about 30 years. Based on this cooperative and trust relationship between two agencies, the agreement aims to strengthen the cooperation creation structure which promotes and organizes new cooperative activities.

The agreement also sets forth basic terms and conditions for cooperation with CNES. Implementing Arrangement concerning Cooperative Activities related to Analysis of Return Samples by MicrOmega at the JAXA Extraterrestrial Sample Curation Center was signed as the first cooperation under this new inter-agency agreement.

We are pleased to announce that the JAXA Space Exploration Center (JSEC) has decided on the following "International Space Exploration Logo" to symbolize JAXA's future lunar and Mars exploration activities.

This logo was created based on the grand prize-winning design (adult category) of the "JAXA's Lunar and Mars Exploration Logo Contest"(web page in Japanese), held from July to October 2022.

We are also planning to use the following logo designs (respectively based on the grand prize-winning designs in the elementary school and under category, and junior and senior high school category) for various occasions.

Thank you for the many submissions to the "JAXA's Lunar and Mars Exploration Logo Contest". JSEC will continue all efforts towards lunar and Mars exploration.

NASA will provide JAXA with important scientific payloads for the Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission, including MEGANE (Mars-moon Exploration with GAmma rays and NEutrons) and the Pneumatic (P) Sampler.
On 17th April 2023, the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between NASA and JAXA for cooperation on the MMX mission was signed by JAXA President Yamakawa Hiroshi and NASA Deputy Administrator Pamela Melroy, on the occasion of the Space Symposium which took place in Colorado Spring, US.
This signing follows the Exchange of Notes signed between the Japanese and US government on April 11, 2023: https://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/press/release/press4_009664.html (Only in Japanese)

With the help of international partners such as NASA, JAXA will continue all efforts towards a successful MMX mission.

The online workshop “Tackling Extreme Precipitation Events Workshop -Indo-Pacific region-” was held jointly by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) from March 1st to 3rd, 2023. This workshop was one of the efforts under the Quad Space Working Group, which was established after Quad Leaders’ Summit in September 2021. The Quad countries, Australia, India, Japan and the United States, have been promoting practical cooperation in various fields to realize a “free and open Indo-Pacific (FOIP)”. The Quad Space Working Group is working to provide capacity building support in the countries of the Indo-Pacific region for responding to extreme precipitation events by utilizing the Earth observation satellite technology of the Quad countries. The workshop was attended by meteorological and hydrological agencies in and around countries of the Indo-pacific region, various agencies providing expertise and funding in the region and experts from the Quad countries, amounting to about 200 participants from 17 countries.

In the opening session, a keynote speech titled “Transformative Steps to shift the world onto a sustainable and resilient path” was given by Professor Toshio Koike, Director of the International Center for Water Disaster and Risk Management. The first session was the introduction of applications and services based on space-based precipitation services by each of the Quad countries, followed by the second session to share good practices of using the services by four national agencies and three regional agencies. After two sessions, experts form the Quad countries and the Indo-Pacific region discussed how to support capacity building in countries of the Indo-Pacific region for tackling extreme precipitation events through utilizing space-based services in the future. On the third day of the workshop, training on utilization of data of “Himawari” by JMA and “Global Satellite Map of Precipitation (GSMaP)” was held.

JAXA will provide the live coverage of the launch of the first H3 Launch Vehicle (H3 TF1:Test Flight No.1) with Advanced Land Observing Satellite-3 “DAICHI-3” (ALOS-3) onboard based on the new launch date.

Broadcast Start: around 9:40 a.m. (JST) / 0:40 a.m. (UTC) on March 7, 2023
Launch Time: 10:37:55 a.m. (JST) through 10:44:15 a.m. (JST)
Launch Site: JAXA Tanegashima Space Center

The broadcast date is subject to change due to the launch date.

Press Release: Launch Time and Launch window of the First H3 Launch Vehicle （H3TF1）Carrying the Advanced Land Observing Satellite-3 “DAICHI-3” (ALOS-3)

JAXA has responded to Earthquake in Turkey and Syria, and conducted emergency disaster observations and provides data as requested by Disaster and Emergency Management Authority(AFAD), Ministry of Interior in Turkey, through Sentinel Asia and the International Disaster Charter.

Analysis results using these PALSAR-2 data can be seen in "Updates on Earth".

On February 16, 2023, H.E. Mr. Csaba Kőrösi, President of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly and his team visited the JAXA Tsukuba Space Center. Dr. YAMAKAWA Hiroshi, President of JAXA, introduced JAXA’s Earth observation satellites; Global Observing SATellite for Greenhouse gases and Water cycle (GOSAT-GW) and Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-3 (ASMR3) which will be installed on the Global Change Observation Mission-Water (GCOM-W) under development, and JAXA/UNOOSA’s KiboCUBE program. They exchanged views on JAXA’s efforts toward the SDGs and how JAXA can contribute to environmental issues related to “water” and “climate” including water disasters and climate change.

The live coverage of the launch of the first H3 Launch Vehicle(H3/TF1:Test Flight No.1) with Advanced Land Observing Satellite-3 “DAICHI-3” (ALOS-3) onboard until the separation of “Daichi-3.”

Broadcast Start：around 9:45 a.m. (JST) / 0:45 a.m. (UTC) on Feb 17
Launch Window：10:37:55-10:44:15(JST)
Launch Site: JAXA Tanegashima Space Center

The broadcast date is subject to change due to the launch date.

Broadcast：around 10:00(UTC-9) on Feb 15
Launch Window：10:37:55-10:44:15

The broadcast date is subject to change due to the launch date.

On February 7, 2023, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy, and his team visited the JAXA Tsukuba Space Center. Dr. YAMAKAWA Hiroshi, President of JAXA, introduced JAXA facilities including the International Space Station (ISS) Kibo Mission Control Room, Simulation Apparatus for Tumbling target capturing Dynamics (SATDyn), and the test site of X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM) which is one of the JAXA/NASA collaborative mission with ESA. Sen. Nelson and Dr. Yamakawa exchanged prospects on JAXA/NASA partnered missions in a wide range of areas including lunar exploration.

On January 13, 2023, in the presence of Prime Minister Kishida visiting NASA HQ, Mr. Hayashi, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan, and the Honorable Antony Blinken, Secretary of State of the United States of America, signed the Framework Agreement between Japan and the United States of America for Cooperation in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space. Dr. Yamakawa, President of JAXA and Astronaut Hoshide also had the opportunity to witness this signing ceremony.

This agreement sets forth the basic terms and conditions for Japan-U.S. space cooperation for peaceful purposes as well as enables to promote space cooperation and increase efficiency for it between JAXA and U.S. agencies including NASA. We expect that this will further expand the field of cooperation including Artemis Project between Japan and U.S.