Building a satellite with artificial intelligence onboard that is trained in space: For this project, Professor Hakan Kayal from Würzburg is receiving 2.6 million euros from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. Suddenly, circular holes were visible on the surface of Mars that were not there before. On photos of Saturn's moon Enceladus, geysers were discovered that hurl powerful fountains of steam towards space. And on the images sent to Earth by the Mars rover Curiosity, structures were found that look like fossilized worms. All these phenomena, some of which appear to be temporary, were discovered by chance.

Suddenly, circular holes were visible on the surface of Mars that were not there before. On photos of Saturn's moon Enceladus, geysers were discovered that hurl powerful fountains of steam towards space. And on the images sent to Earth by the Mars rover Curiosity, structures were found that look like fossilised worms. All these phenomena, some of which appear to be temporary, were discovered by chance. Or because humans took a lot of time to sift through the images from Earth's neighbouring planets.

A new CIMON for the International Space Station (ISS): CIMON-2 (Crew Interactive MObile companioN) lifted off on its journey into space on 5 December 2019. This modified version of the astronaut assistant has been equipped for new tasks and was developed and built in Germany. Like its predecessor, CIMON-2 will be deployed in the Columbus European research module. CIMON is a free-flying, spherical technology demonstrator for human-machine interaction and features artificial intelligence. "CIMON-1 – our prototype – landed back on Earth on 27 August 2019 after spending 14 months on the ISS, and has now arrived at Airbus in Friedrichshafen," says Dr Christian Karrasch, CIMON Project Manager at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) Space Administration in Bonn.