Annales Geophysicae

2010 marks 10 years in space for the Cluster mission, a cornerstone of the European Space Agency (ESA) science programme in collaboration with NASA. Cluster is the first flotilla of four satellites flying in a tight formation around Earth. In 10 years, Cluster and other space missions like THEMIS and Double Star have enabled a leap forward in our understanding of space plasma physics phenomena including: the origin of the auroras, magnetic reconnection, shocks, turbulence and the science behind space weather. This milestone of the Cluster project was celebrated at the Cluster-THEMIS-Double Star workshop held in Greece late September 2010 by more than 170 scientists coming from China, Europe, Japan, Russia and the United States. THEMIS is a NASA mission launched in 2007, composed of five spacecraft first dedicated to the study of auroral substorms. Double Star is a magnetospheric mission composed of two satellites launched in 2003 and 2004, a joint project between the China National Space Administration (CNSA) and ESA. The workshop focused on the most recent advances brought by these multi-point capability missions, punctuated by review talks on scientific achievements and historical perspective exposé of the Cluster mission. More than 80 talks were given in the course of 6 plenary sessions while about 100 posters were presented during two poster sessions. This special issue contains some of the new science presented at the workshop.