The Space Research Institute (Institut für Weltraumforschung, IWF) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (AAS) covers the Austrian activities in Solar System Exploration, in Near-Earth Space Plasma Physics, and in Satellite Geodesy.

It is involved in many international space projects and cooperates with the European Space Agency (ESA), with national space agencies in the US (NASA), in France (CNES), in Japan (JAXA), and in China (CNSA), and with more than 100 research institutes worldwide.