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CHEOPS (CHaracterising ExOPlanets Satellite) is a planned European space telescope for the study of the formation of extrasolar planets.
Slated for launch in 2017, the mission aims to bring an optical Ritchey–Chrétien telescope with an aperture of 30 cm, mounted on a standard small satellite platform, into a sun-synchronous orbit of about 800 km altitude. For the planned mission duration of 3.5 years, CHEOPS is to examine transiting exoplanets on known bright and nearby host stars. Its main goal will be to accurately measure the radii of the exoplanets for which ground-based spectroscopic surveys have already provided mass estimates. Knowing both the mass and the size of the exoplanets will allow scientists to determine the planets' approximate composition, such as whether they are gaseous or rocky.
