INPE - 1998

• Launch of SCD-2 satellite by a Pegasus rocket, in the American Base at Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA. With this launch the initial MECB task was completed.
  
  
  SCD-2 satellite integrated to Pegasus Rocket.
• Until 2002 INPE leads the Large-Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazon – LBA, the most important scientific experiment held in Tropical regions.
• First Measurements of mesopause temperature profile in Brazil.
• Solar Cell Experiment II (ECS-II) placed aboard SCD- 2 aimed at testing new technologies in solar cells for space use developed in LAS.
• Project to transfer technology to national industry of medical and dental devices in diamond CVD was born in Associated Laboratory of Sensors and Materials (LAS).

  Worldwide

• The U.S. unmanned space craft "Lunar Prospector" finds ice at the Moon poles.

• Data sent from Galileo spacecraft indicate that in Jupiter's moon, Europa, there is a liquid ocean beneath a thin ice layer.

• The first pieces of International Space Station are transported into space.

• Google website is launched, the search engine most popular and used by Internet users.

• FDA (Food and Drug Administration of USA) approves Viagra for treating male impotence, becoming the first drug approved to treat this disease in United States.