page_title: 21st century
section_title: Space exploration
hierarchical_section_title: 21st century / Science and technology / Space exploration
caption_attribution_description: English: January 15, 2015 - RELEASE 15-011 NASA’s New Horizons Spacecraft Begins First Stages of Pluto Encounter http://www.nasa.gov/press/2015/january/nasa-s-new-horizons-spacecraft-begins-first-stages-of-pluto-encounter Artist’s concept of NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft as it passes Pluto and Pluto’s largest moon, Charon, in July 2015.
context_page_description: The 21st century is the current century of the Anno Domini era or Common Era, in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. It began on January 1, 2001, and will end on December 31, 2100. It is the first century of the 3rd millennium.
  The beginning of the 21st century has been marked by the rise of a global economy and Third World consumerism, deepening global concern over terrorism and an increase in private enterprise. Effects of global warming and rising sea levels continued, with eight islands disappearing between 2007 and 2014. The Arab Spring of the early 2010s led to mixed outcomes in the Arab world, resulting in several civil wars and governments overthrown.
  The United States has remained the only global superpower, although China is generally considered an emerging superpower.
  In 2017, about half of the world's population lived in "some form of democracy", though only 4.5 percent lived in "full democracies".
  The European Union has greatly expanded in the 21st century, adding
  13 member states. Most member states of the European Union introduced a common currency, the Euro, and the United Kingdom withdrew from the European Union.
context_section_description: 2001 – Dennis Tito becomes the first space tourist by paying $19 million to board the International Space Station.
  2003 – Space Shuttle Columbia disaster February 1.
  2003 – The Chinese space program launches its first manned space flight, Shenzhou 5, on October 15. This made China the third country in the world to have indigenous manned space capability.
  2004 – Mars Exploration Rovers land on Mars; Opportunity discovers evidence that an area of Mars was once covered in water.
  2004 – SpaceShipOne makes the first privately funded human spaceflight, June 21.
  2005 – The Huygens probe lands on Titan, the largest of Saturn's moons, January 14.
  2006 – The New Horizons probe is launched to Pluto, on January 19.
  2006 – Pluto is reclassified from a planet to a dwarf planet, leaving the solar system with eight planets.
  2007 – China launches its first lunar mission with the Chang'e 1, on October 24.
  2008 - India launches its first lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 which included a remote sensing orbiter and impactor on 22 October 2008. It made India the third nation to place its flag on Moon.
  2008 – Chinese space program launches its third manned space flight carrying its first three-person crew and conducts its first spacewalk that makes China the third nation after Russia and USA to do that, Shenzhou 7, on September 25.
  2008 – Phoenix discovers water ice on Mars.
  2009 – Iran launches its first satellite, Omid, on February 2.
  2009 – The Indian Space Research Organisation discovers water on the Moon.
  2011 – NASA retires the last Space Shuttle, Atlantis, marking an end to its three-decade shuttle program.
  2012 – The 50th successful launch in a row for the European launcher Ariane 5, on August 2.
  2012 – SpaceX successfully delivers cargo to the International Space Station.
  2012 – NASA successfully lands the Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars.
  2014 – India's Mars Orbiter Mission, the nation's first attempt to send a spacecraft to Mars, successfully entered orbit on September 24, making India the fourth nation in the world to reach that goal.
  2014 – The European Space Agency robotic spacecraft Philae landed successfully on the comet 67P, the first cometary landing ever.
  2015 – On July 14, NASA's New Horizons spacecraft became the first to fly by Pluto, on a mission to photograph and collect data on its planetary system. No other spacecraft has yet performed such a mission so far from Earth.
  2015 – On September 28, NASA announces that liquid water has been found on Mars.
  2016 – On July 4, NASA's Juno space probe maneuvered into a polar orbit to study the planet Jupiter.
  2017 – Seven Earth-sized exoplanets are discovered around TRAPPIST-1, three of which are potentially habitable.
  2017 – SpaceX launches SES-10 on a re-used first stage, becoming the first re-flight of an orbital-class booster.
  2019 – New Horizons performs a flyby of 486958 Arrokoth, the most distant object to be visited by a spacecraft.
  2019 – Chinese probe Chang'e 4 becomes the first human-made object to land on the far side of the Moon.
  2019 – NASA concludes the 15-year Opportunity rover mission after being unable to wake the rover from hibernation.
  2019 – Israel launched its first spacecraft, Beresheet, towards the Moon on April 7; after two months of journey, the spacecraft failed to land and crashed on the surface of the Moon, what made Israel the seventh country to successfully orbit the Moon.
  2019 – The first image of the supermassive black hole inside galaxy Messier 87 was captured by the Event Horizon Telescope.
caption: Artist's impression of New Horizons' close encounter with the Pluto–Charon system.
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