The National Remote Sensing Center of China (NRSCC) is the Chinese organisation in charge of Earth Observation.  

Its main functions:

• to provide recommendations and solutions to the development strategy, planning and overall policy decision of remote sensing technology and its industrialization for MOST by studying the status, trends and challenges;
• to operate the remote sensing services to the General Office of State Council (GOSC) on information about disasters, agriculture, ecology and environment etc.;
• to implement projects on remote sensing and space information technology under various national R&D programs of China, such as National High Technology Research and Development Program (863 Program), National Key Technology R&D Program and Mega-Projects of Science Research, as trusted by of MOST, and to promote industrialization of relevant results;
• to organize and coordinate the implementation of China-Europe Cooperation Project on Galileo;
• to participate in the formulation, assessment and accreditation of related national standards, norms and regulations in earth observation and navigation technology;
• to promote and organize multilateral and bilateral international cooperation projects, and to organize related training and personnel exchange activities; to act as the contacting point of the China-European GNSS Technology Training and Cooperation Center;
• to host the China Secretariat of the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS) , China Secretariat of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO), and act as the national focal point of the United Nations Regional Space Applications Program for Sustainable Development in Asia and the Pacific (RESAP);
• to liaise with remote sensing institutes in China, to provide technical training and consultancy services.

The technical fields of NRSCC have been extended from remote sensing and geographic information system to the domain of earth observation and navigation technology, including remote sensing, geographic information system, satellite navigation and positioning, and deep space exploration. Its overall function is to organize and implement national scientific and technological plans in the field of earth observation and navigation technology. It aims at developing innovation capacity of China and fostering the strategic new industry in remote sensing, geographic information system and navigation and positioning. It is characterized by the international cooperation and the national strengths by mode of "condensed kernel, wide network". NRSCC also provides the technical support to major strategic decisions for the national economic construction, social sustainable development by exerting the advantages of remote sensing science and technology.

The Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC) is an independent laboratory of Stanford University, USA.

It aims to to serve as a bridge between the disciplines of astrophysics, cosmology and particle physics. KIPAC's members work in the Physics and Applied Physics Departments on the Stanford campus and at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. Its mission is to bring the resources of modern computational, experimental, observational and theoretical science to bear on our understanding of the universe at large.

KIPAC was founded in 2003 by a gift by Fred Kavli and The Kavli Foundation. It is housed on the grounds of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, as well as on the main Stanford campus. 

Suzaku (formerly ASTRO-EII) is a Japanese X-ray astronomy satellite.

It was launched on 10 July 2005 aboard the M-V-6 rocket. The project was renamed Suzaku after its successful launch after the mythical Vermilion bird of the South.

Suzaku is carrying high spectroscopic resolution, very wide energy band instruments for detecting signals ranging from soft X-rays up to gamma-rays (0.3–600 keV). High resolution spectroscopy and wide-band are essential factors to physically investigate high energy astronomical phenomena, such as black holes and supernovae. One such feature, the broad iron K line, may be key to more direct imaging of black holes.

Just weeks after launch, on 29 July 2005 the first of series of cooling system malfunctions occurred, that ultimately on 8 August 2005 caused the entire reservoir of liquid helium to boil off into space. This effectively shut down the XRS which is the spacecraft's primary instrument. The two other instruments, XIS and HXD, were unaffected by the malfunction, and there are plans (Oct. 2013) to integrate another XRS into the proposed NeXT X-ray observation satellite planned for launch in 2014.

The Large Underground Xenon Detector (LUX) is a 370 kg liquid xenon physics experiment that aims to directly detect interactions between Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP) dark matter and ordinary matter on Earth.

Despite the wealth of evidence supporting the existence of non-baryonic dark matter in the Universe, dark matter in our galaxy has never been directly detected on Earth. The LUX experiment utilizes a large detector mass in a time-projection chamber (TPC) configuration to identify individual particle interactions in the liquid xenon volume, which will allow it to look for faint dark matter interactions with unprecedented sensitivity.

The LUX experiment is located 4,850 ft (about 1 mile) underground at the Sanford Underground Research Facility (formerly the Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory) in Lead, South Dakota. Underground, the detector is located in the Davis campus, the former site of the Nobel-prize winning Homestake neutrino experiment led by Raymond Davis. The LUX experiment needs to be operated underground in order to reduce signal background caused by high-energy cosmic rays at the Earth's surface.

The LUX experimental collaboration is composed of more than 100 scientists and engineers across 18 institutions in the US and Europe.

The detector assembly began in late 2009. The fully assembled detector was transported from the surface laboratory to the underground space in a two-day operation in the summer of 2012.

Aerospace Research & Engineering Systems Institute, Inc. (ARES Institute) is an American  501 (c)(3) tax-exempt non-profit organization  founded to promote space exploration and STEM education through hands-on research projects involving industry and students of all ages. Our mission includes public outreach through media activities, including our flagship publication, Zero-G News.

ARES Institute came to life in 2003 in the wake of the Columbia accident and recognition of the need to increase public support for space exploration as well as STEM education in America’s schools. One of the ways we do this is by creating unique projects utilizing nanosatellite technologies to design and build hardware and experiments that may actually fly in space.

Currently (Oct. 2013), we are working on a project we have named “LunarSail”. 

LunarSail is a cubesat-based space mission established by the Aerospace Research & Engineering Systems Institute, Inc. (ARES Institute).

LunarSail is designed to use a solar sail to propel a small spacecraft from Earth orbit onto a lunar orbit rendezvous trajectory and execute orbital insertion around the Moon.  A primary objective of the LunarSail mission is to serve as a testbed for cubesat operations beyond low Earth orbit and applications requiring cislunar or interplanetary rendezvous. It is a proposed cubesat mission intended to demonstrate practical application of solar sail technology for propulsion, trajectory/attitude control and rendezvous with another body in space. With LunarSail, we will take advantage of the cubesat platform to conduct a first of its kind mission to use a solar sail to send a spacecraft to the Moon and then utilize the sail's unique characteristics to navigate into lunar orbit.

LunarSail will be the first solar sail to enter Lunar orbit. The first crowdsourced mission to cislunar space. 

Generation Orbit Launch Services, Inc. is a private company offering small satellite launch services.

GOLS serves micro and nano satellite developers struggling to find dedicated and cost-effective space access by offering fast, flexible and affordable primary launch manifesting through GOLauncher, an air-launched space transportation system specifically designed for small payloads.

The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), informally called Mangalyaan  by the media, is a planned Mars orbiter to be launched in November 2013 by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

The mission is a "technology demonstrator" project aiming to develop the technologies required for design, planning, management and operations of an interplanetary mission. The Mars Orbiter Mission probe is set to lift-off from First Launch Pad at Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, using a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket on November 5, 2013. This will be India's first mission to Mars.

Dauria Aerospace is a satellite manufacturer. It manufactures low cost small satellites.

The reduction of costs combined with enhanced performance capabilities makes constellations of satellites financially viable, thus enabling operational services and creating new applications. The company currently (Oct 2013) has two satellite development centers:

• in Skolkovo, Moscow
• in NASA Ames Research Center, California

Dauria, which is headquartered in Munich, is part of the space cluster at the Skolkovo Innovation Center on the outskirts of Moscow.

World View Enterprises, Inc. is a new venture (date: Oct. 2013) headed by veteran space entrepreneurs plans to send tourists on a balloon up to an altitude of 19 miles, to give them the kind of spacey view that Felix Baumgartner saw last year — at a price of about $75,000 a ticket.

Arizona-based World View Enterprises said it would offer 30-kilometer-high balloon rides starting no earlier than 2016. It plans to start selling tickets sometime in the next few months, even as it continues development of its balloon and pressurized gondola in Tucson.

The company unveiled its plans on Tuesday 22 Oct. 2013, after the Federal Aviation Administration determined that the venture would follow the rules that govern commercial spaceflight rather than the more stringent rules for atmospheric balloon trips. World View says has completed some component testing for the balloon system and will begin subscale testing early next year.

The World View balloon wouldn't get anywhere near the internationally accepted 100-kilometer (62-mile) boundary of outer space, and riders wouldn't feel any zero-gravity sensation. But the experience would give them the kind of black-sky view associated with high-altitude balloon flights — like the ones that have put cameras, action figures and a Hello Kitty doll into the stratosphere.