Three officials from the European Space Agency (ESA), headed by Prof. David Southwood, ESA director of Science and Robotic 

ESA officials visit the observatory (Picture/IHEP)

Exploration, visited Yangbajing (YBJ) Cosmic Ray Observatory in Tibet and Tibet University on June 26th, 2010.

The guests inspected the Sino-Japanese ASγ Experiment and the Sino–Italian Astroparticle-physics Experiment (ARGO-YBJ).

Prof. ZHANG Shuangnan, director of the Division for Particle Astrophysics, Institute of High Energy Physics, delivered a report "the Scientific Achievements and Future Plans of YBJ Project" in which he introduced that key techniques such as imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes, air shower core detector and µ-detecting techniques would be further developed, the coverage of the detector array would be extended to 10,000 km2 in the coming five to ten years, and the Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory (LHAASO Project) would also be developed.

The ESA officials spoke highly of the achievements and future plans of YBJ Project. They showed great interests in possible cooperation on ground-space-intersecting observation. In Tibet University, the guests and the local officials exchanged ideas over cosmic ray, space science and space environment research, talent training and so on.