Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
The future of space-based astrometric missions appears to be very promising. Three missions were described at IAU Colloquium 180. These are the Full-sky Astrometric Mapping Explorer (FAME), the Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) and the Global Astrometric Interferometer for Astrophysics (GAIA) missions. These missions will substantially improve the accuracy of global astrometric measurements made by the Hipparcos space mission by factors of 20 to 250. A brief summary of these projects is given.