French space program
During the late 18th century, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, Jacques Charles and the Montgolfier brothers are seen as worldwide precursors and explorers of aeronautics, with the world record altitude then reached by a human at 7,016 metres (23,018 ft) performed by Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac in 1804.
Those names, their numerous students and their works will mark the early expertise of France's space program in all types of air balloons since.
[4] The beginning of the institutional French space program dates back to 1946 when, right after World War II, the Laboratoire de recherches balistiques et aérodynamiques (LRBA, Ballistic and aerodynamic research laboratory) was formed in Vernon to develop the next generation of rockets, partly taking advantage of the German development of the V2 rocket.
In 1961, de Gaulle signed the creation of the Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES) to coordinate French space activities.
[10] Since 2010, France and Russia have been collaborating on several space missions, including long-run science programmes like Cardiomed, dedicated to monitoring cardiovascular health in cosmonauts.
[11] In 2016, for the COP21, CNES and ISRO impulsed a groundbreaking and worldwide plan to unite all space agencies for the gathering of satellite information and detection on greenhouse gas emissions, allowing more precise measurements and decision making.
[12] In addition, CNES and ESA have a strong background of collaboration, notably building the largest single satellite surveyance program for earth's biological monitoring (Copernicus Programme).
[15] The French space agency was also responsible for the construction of the main instruments on the French-German-American InSight mission to Mars, which launched on 5 May 2018 and landed on 26 November 2018.
On 20 October 2018, CNES and JAXA launched the BepiColombo mission to study the magnetic field of Mercury and map its surface.
On 29 October 2018, the CFOSAT [fr] (China-France Oceanography SATellite) was placed into Earth orbit to study ocean surface winds and waves.
In 2025, France and Germany will launch their collaborative mission Merlin, due to study methane levels and concentrations in the Earth's atmosphere.
