The AGILE space mission

AGILE is an Italian Space Agency mission dedicated to the exploration of the gamma-ray Universe. The AGILE, very innovative instrument, combines for the first time a gamma-ray imager (sensitive in the range 30 MeV-50 GeV) and a hard X-ray imager (sensitive in the range 18-60 keV). An optimal angular resolution and very large fields of view are obtained by the use of state-of-the-art Silicon detectors integrated in a very compact instrument. AGILE was successfully launched on April 23, 2007 from the Indian base of Sriharikota and was inserted in an optimal low-particle background equatorial orbit. AGILE will provide crucial data for the study of Active Galactic Nuclei, Gamma-Ray Bursts, unidentified gamma-ray sources, galactic compact objects, supernova remnants, TeV sources, and fundamental physics by microsecond timing. The AGILE Cycle-1 pointing program started on 2007 December 1, and is open to the international community through a Guest Observer Program. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.