The Dark Energy Survey (DES) is designed to probe the origin of the accelerating universe and help uncover the nature of dark energy by measuring the 14-billion-year history of cosmic expansion with high precision.

More than 120 scientists from 23 institutions in the United States, Spain, the United Kingdom, Brazil, and Germany are working on the project. This collaboration is building an extremely sensitive 570-Megapixel digital camera, DECam, and will mount it on the Blanco 4-meter telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory high in the Chilean Andes. Starting in Sept. 2012 and continuing for five years, DES will survey a large swath of the southern sky out to vast distances in order to provide new clues to this most fundamental of questions.   

The survey nature of DES is driven by its science requirements which require information about a large number of galaxies at the most distant reaches of the viewable universe. The DES will catalog the sky in a 5000 square degree area over 525 nights of viewing using the new Dark Energy Camera (DECam). It will record information on over 300 million galaxies, most so faint that their light is around 1 million times fainter than the dimmest star that can be seen with the naked eye. Some of these galaxies are so distant that the light we see from them will have left the galaxy when the universe was less than half its current age.

DES tries to answer the question: Why is the universe expansion speeding up?

The U.S. Space & Rocket Center is offering a comprehensive U.S. manned space flight hardware museum and space education facilities.

Its facilities include Spacedome Theater, Rocket Park, Space Camp and an Education Training Center which houses NASA's Educator Resource Center. 

Space Investment Company is a provider of inspiring and entertaining educational experiences in space science and aviation in the Middle East, North Africa and the Indian Sub-Continent.

The company's obejective is to bring the U.S. space technology to the Asian and African continents through SpaceWorld villages in the Arabian Gulf, India and North Africa. It acquired the Space Camp and Aviation technology licenses from the U.S. Space & Rocket Center with a mission: To use U.S. Space & Aviation Technology to stimulate regional interest in the study of aerospace sciences. The company aims to see thousands of Space and Aviation Scientists in non-US regions, scientists who are as competent as those preceding them in America. It propose the following activities:

• Exploration of the dynamics of space and aviation;
• Simulation of the challenges astronauts and pilots encounter during missions;
• Discovery of one's self and the universe in order to reach new heights.

Locations: India, Egypt, United Arab Emirates

SPACE is an Indian company churning out innovative and exciting hands-on astronomy education and astro-tourism services.

The company offers a set of products ranging from recreational science solutions, skill development workshops, stress management, educative & entertaining activities that can be customized as per clients.

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia, IAA-CSIC) is an astrophysics-related research institute.

It is located in Granada, Andalusia, Spain. IAA activities are related with research in the field of astrophysics, and instrumental development both for telescopes and space missions. Scientific research at the institute covers the following areas:

1. solar system;
2. star formation, stellar structure and evolution;
3. galaxy formation and evolution; and
4. cosmology.

The IAA was created as a research institute of the CSIC in July 1975. Presently (in 2012), the IAA operates the Sierra Nevada Observatory. It operates as well the Calar Alto Observatory jointly with the Max-Planck Institute of Heidelberg.

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía is divided in the following departments:

• Department of Extragalactic Astronomy
• Violent Stellar Formation Group
• AMIGA Group (Analysis of the interstellar Medium of Isolated Galaxies)
• Department of Stellar Physics
• Department of Radio Astronomy and Galactic Structure
• Stellar Systems Group
• Department of Solar System

Sinclair Interplanetary is a supplier of hardware, software, training and expertise to the spacecraft community.

The primary focus is on low-cost, rapid-schedule programs to produce micro- or nano-satellites. It is based in Toronto, Canada and was founded in 2001.

The Dnepr rocket is a space launch vehicle named after the Dnieper River.

It is a converted ICBM used for launching artificial satellites into orbit, operated by the launch service provider ISC Kosmotras. The first launch, on April 21, 1999, successfully placed UoSAT-12, a 350 kg demonstration mini-satellite, into a 650 km circular Low Earth orbit.

The Dnepr is based on the R-36MUTTH ICBM – called the SS-18 Satan by NATO.

The Space Grant Education and Enterprise Institute is a non-profit organisation which aims to enable students of all ethnic and financial backgrounds to attain high skill technical and professional careers through education and exciting programs.

The Mars Institute is a non-profit research organization whose mission is to further the scientific study, exploration and public understanding of Mars. It is an international non-governmental organization. 

It is conducting high-quality, peer-reviewed research, and educating the public on the progress toward and benefits of Mars exploration.

It was incorporated as a non-profit corporation in both California, USA, and Canada in 2002. 

Ecliptic Enterprises is an American company that creates on-board imaging systems for use with rockets, spacecraft, and other remote platforms. It is based in Pasadena, Calif., USA.

Ecliptic Enterprises also provides cost-effective space-access solutions for small space payloads. 

The activities of Ecliptic Enterprises encompass:

• imaging and sensor technology for spacecraft,
• small secondary, payload technologies,
• space transportation technologies.