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The landing site for Rosetta's Philae probe that will try to land on comet 67P next week now has an official name. 

Previously known only as 'Site J', the area is now called Agilkia and will be the location of the first-ever attempt to land on a comet on 12 November.

If successful, Philae will study the surface of the comet with a variety of instruments until March 2015 at the latest.  

Esa, headquartered in Paris, has named its comet landing site. Called 'Agilkia' - previously just 'Site J' - it will be the target of the Philae lander next week (illustration of landing shown). The name was picked for its relation to the Egyptian origins of the probe

The name was selected by a jury comprising members of the Philae Lander Steering Committee as part of a public competition run from 16 to 22 October by Esa and the German, French and Italian space agencies.

Agilkia was one of the most popular entries, proposed by over 150 participants.

The committee selected Alexandre Brouste from France as the overwall winner, although more than 150 others had also suggested the name.

As a prize, Mr Brouste will be invited to Esa's Space Operations Control Centre in Darmstadt, Germany, to follow the landing live.

'The decision was very tough,' saidProfessor Felix Huber of the DLR German Aerospace Center, chair of the Steering Committee.

'We received so many good suggestions on how to name Site J, and we were delighted with such an enthusiastic response from all over the world. We wish to thank all participants for sharing their great ideas with us.'

Dr Fred Jansen, Esa Rosetta Mission manager, added: 'It couldn't be a more appropriate name.

'The relocation of the temples of Philae Island to Agilkia Island was an ambitious technical endeavour performed in the 1960s and 1970s to preserve an archaeological record of our ancient history.

'On 12 November, we'll be attempting a unique comet landing, an even more ambitious endeavour to unlock secrets of our most remote origins.'

Below is a short science fiction film made for the Rosetta mission starring Aidan Gillen from Game of Thrones

Philae will attempt to land on the surface of Comet 67P (illustration shown) on 12 November. If successful it will study the surface until March 2015 at the latest. Rosetta's mission will continue much longer. Images of the comet recently revealed dunes and boulders on its surface

As the Rosetta space probe prepares for its historic attempt to deploy a lander on comet 67P, BAE Systems revealed the technology it has pioneered to make the £1 billion ($1.6 billion) programme possible.

At its Advanced Technology Centre in Great Baddow, Essex, a team of engineers developed a 'smartphone-like system' that enables Esa to communicate with and control the movements of the probe, which is currently more than 310 million miles (500 million kilometres) away.

In addition, BAE Systems' technology makes sure all the imagery of the comet and scientific data Rosetta is capturing to be received back on Earth.

The system, known as the Intermediate Frequency Modem System (IFMS), is capable of measuring Rosetta's speed to within fractions of a millimetre per second.

It can also measure its distance to within 3.3ft (one metre) anywhere in the solar system, factors which are critical to the success of the mission.

When used at two ground stations, it uses triangulation to determine the direction with an accuracy of a millionth of a degree- equivalent to the apparent diameter of a coin 620 miles (1,000km) away.

Nick James, BAE Systems' lead engineer for the project, said: 'Approaching, orbiting, and landing on a comet requires delicate and supremely accurate manoeuvres.

'The target comet is a relatively small object about 4 kilometres [2.5 miles] in diameter, moving at incredible speeds through the solar system.

'To help make any of this possible, what we have done, in layman's terms, is create a 'smartphone' for inter-planetary communication that gives Esa the capability to communicate with and control the Rosetta probe throughout its 10 year mission as it travels more than five times Earth's distance from the Sun.'  

The interplanetary 'smartphone' guiding the Rosetta Space Probe is pictured here. As Rosetta prepares for its historic attempt to deploy a lander on comet, BAE Systems revealed the technology it has pioneered which makes the programme possible, known as the Intermediate Frequency Modem System (IFMS)

Esa released this mosaic of Rosetta's comet last week. It reveals fascinating details on the surface including boulders. Dunes of dust can also be seen drifting across

Last week, the IFMS was used to transmit new images of the comet back to Earth, revealing its surface in unprecedented detail.

In the pictures, an incredible amount of detail can be spotted - including boulders on the surface and dust moving across plains. 

The latest images of comet 67P were taken from a distance of six miles (9.8km) from the comet's centre and revealed in a blog post by Esa.

Four new images were released and combined into one mosaic image. In those images the scale is about 26 inches (66 cm) per pixel.

The mosaic covers about 3,940 to 4,430ft (1,200 to 1,350 metres) on the comet's surface.

Towards the upper left of the image is an area of bright material that was cast in shadow in previous images, possibly at the base of a cliff.

A recent landslide of sorts may have uncovered this material.

Esa adds, though, that the brightness of the images is a little bit misleading, as the comet is actually blacker than coal.

In order to make features, visible the images are grey-scaled and also set to a high contrast to make them appear brighter.

'Also not seen previously in this much detail are the two boulders just below the centre of the mosaic, one of which takes on a heart-shaped appearance from this angle,' Space Science Editor Emily Baldwin wrote for Esa on their blog.

'Zooming in reveals hints of a layered structure and both objects seems to be appearing from beneath the dusty layer, just like some of the smaller 'boulders' around them.'

Within the images can also be seen a mysterious pyramid-shaped rock that was previously spotted by Esa. It can be seen just above the middle in the mosaic.  

At around 82ft-tall (25 metres), the structure is one of the larger boulders seen on the comet and could help scientists better understand its history. 

Boulder Cheops, taken by Rosetta's OSIRIS camera on 19 September, from a distance of 17.7 miles (28.5km)

In this image released on 18 October, meanwhile, dunes can be seen drifting down the centre

Rosetta spacecraft: Story of the comet-chaser

Rosetta took an incredible selfie of its 131ft (40 metre) solar wings gleaming against the darkness of space last month. In the background is the duck-shaped comet, Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, with its distinct 'head' and 'body' clearly visible