Complementing this are three additional payloads — an Ultraviolet Aurora Imager for capturing images of auroras over Earth's polar regions, a Light Ion Analyzer for measuring charged particles, and a Magnetometer for monitoring changes in the magnetic field. Together, the instruments provide simultaneous global-scale imaging of magnetospheric dynamics and in-situ measurements of solar wind parameters, offering unprecedented capabilities for studying geomagnetic storms and other space weather phenomena.

Beyond its scientific value, Dai Lei, chief designer of SMILE's science application system and a professor at the National Space Science Center, emphasized that the mission's success is rooted in 50-50 cooperation between China and Europe — a model of international collaboration that exemplifies "an equal, mutually beneficial, and complementary approach."

"Building upon the legacy of the Double Star Program — a China-led space cooperation project with ESA proposed in 2003 — SMILE has established a new model for international space collaboration. This is the first bottom-up, mission-level, full-lifecycle partnership between CAS and ESA," Dai said.

CAS assumed primary responsibility for the satellite platform, mission operation and control, and the science application system, while ESA provided the payload module, launch vehicle, launch site, and ground tracking and emergency support. The University of Leicester in the United Kingdom led development of the Soft X-ray Imager, while CAS led development of the other three instruments, drawing on European expertise in key components and calibration.

The mission also built an end-to-end engineering system integrating six major subsystems over the past decade. Within this framework, scientists from both sides jointly tackled key technological challenges, including cross-regional design, system compatibility and joint acceptance testing, fostering an efficient and stable collaborative mechanism that ensured the mission's timely and high-quality execution.

Following the launch, SMILE will spend around 42 days maneuvering into its final science orbit. It will then undergo a two-month in-orbit commissioning phase before beginning its three-year routine observation mission.

During its operational life span, scientists from China and Europe will jointly process and analyze the collected data. All scientific data will be openly shared with the global research community, promoting broad international participation and discovery.

The long-term observational data from SMILE is expected to advance understanding of solar wind-magnetosphere interactions and space weather mechanisms. The mission is also expected to support efforts to improve the accuracy of space weather forecasting and enhance the security of the near-Earth space environment.

Looking beyond SMILE, Wang outlined a broader vision for China-Europe collaboration. He said that during the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-30), the China-Europe space exploration program, which includes the SMILE mission, will launch a series of satellites.

These include the Hongmeng Project to probe the universe's dark ages and dawn, the Earth 2.0 mission to search for Earth-like planets, and the enhanced X-ray Timing and Polarimetry space observatory (eXTP), which will study physical laws in extreme conditions such as black holes and neutron stars, Wang said.