<ul><li>The Gaia Observatory from the European Space Agency (ESA) has been powered down and sent into a “retirement orbit” around the sun.</li><li>Gaia has created a detailed 3D map of the Milky Way, revealing its structure and uncovering evidence of galactic mergers, new star clusters, exoplanets, and black holes.</li><li>The collected data will continue to be released and analyzed, with a fourth data release planned for 2026.</li><li>As the mission ends, the Gaia team deliberately corrupted the spacecraft's onboard software, overwriting it with a farewell message and the names of the mission contributors.</li></ul>

Saying farewell to Gaia, as the Milky Way-mapping space telescope mission ends

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