15 Amazing Space Missions to Watch in 2015

Space fans have a lot to look forward to next year.

Closely watched spacecraft are expected to start pumping out science, whileprivate spaceflightcompanies have a number of launches on the books for 2015. A Mars rover will celebrate its third anniversary chugging along on the Red Planet, and a Japanese spacecraft will have another chance to make it into orbit around Venus. Next year could also mark the return of Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Cygnus spacecraft to the International Space Station after a launch accident in October 2014.

Here are Space.com's major missions to keep an eye out for next year: [The Most Important Spaceflight Stories of 2014]

XCOR Aerospace and the Lynx space plane: Through 2015

XCOR Aerospace the company building the Lynx space plane has been making steady progress with the Lynx for the last few years. The plane is designed to take commercial customers and science payloads on flights to suborbital space. Lynx has room for one pilot and one passenger (as well as scientific experiments) on each flight, which reaches 330,000 feet (100 kilometers) into the air.

SpaceX reusable rocket landing on ocean platform: No earlier than Jan. 6

The private spaceflight company SpaceX is planning to land the first stage of a Falcon 9 rocket on a floating platform in the Atlantic Ocean no earlier than Jan. 6, after launching an uncrewed Dragon cargo capsule to the International Space Station. This will mark the first time anyone has ever attempted this kind of reusable rocket test, SpaceX representatives have said. SpaceX is also planning three more cargo launches in 2015 under a contract with NASA.

DSCOVR satellite launching to space: No earlier than Jan. 29

The Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) is set for launch on SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket on Jan. 23. The satellite is designed to monitor solar wind from about 900,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) from Earth. The DSCOVR mission is a partnership among NOAA, NASA and the U.S. Air Force, and some version of the mission has been in process for more than 10 years.

Europe's IXV space plane prototype test flight: Feb. 11

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15 Amazing Space Missions to Watch in 2015