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Past opportunities 2016

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ESA / Education / ESA Academy

Post-Alpbach School Summer School event 2016
21-24 November 2016

Status: Call for applications closed on 9 September 2016; only opened to students who participated in the Alpbach Summer School 2016training course delivered

Description: Students got the opportunity to carry on working on the PoPSAT (Polar Precipitation SATellite) project proposed by the team Blue during the Alpbach Summer School 2016. The objective of this event was to prepare a scientific paper to be presented at an international conference or published in a scientific journal. Students were supported by ESA and external experts, and had the opportunity to use the ESA Academy's Concurrent Design Facility (CDF).

Schedule:

Day 1 Guidelines for the event
POPSAT presentation
ESA Redu Centre visit
Preparation for CDF session
First CDF session
Day 2 Mission redefinition
Second CDF session
Day 3 Preparation of oral presentation and  draft article
Conclusion of CDF sessions
Delivery of preliminary oral presentation and draft article
Review and feedback from tutors
Day 4 Integration of tutors comments
Finalisation of oral presentation and draft article
Visit of the Centre Spatial de Liège
Final oral presentation
 
 

Ladybird Guide to Space Operations training course 2016
11-14 October 2016

Statuscall for applications: closed; training course delivered.

Description:  Students learnt about:

  • the challenges of operating a spacecraft (as opposed to designing a spacecraft)
  • the operator’s view on all the spacecraft subsystems and the design features to implement in order to operate them
  • ‘physiological’ traps to be avoided during operations and testing

Taught by an ESA expert from the Advanced Operations Concepts Office of ESA’ European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), Darmstadt, Germany, the course was delivered through formal lectures without excessive mathematics or technical jargon, but with a heavy emphasis placed on the interaction with the students.

Schedule:

Day 1 & 2 Introduction - the difference between design and operations engineers
Mission design and payloads
Attitude Dynamic and Control Subsystems
Orbit Control System
Power
Day 3 & 4 Power (Storage)
Thermal
Telemetry-Tracking and Control Subsystems
Command and Control
On-board processors
On-board software and Fault Detection, Isolation and Recovery
Group Exercise and Summary
 
 

Concurrent Engineering Workshop 2016
20-23 September 2016

Statuscall for applications closed; training course delivered

Description: Students learnt about concurrent engineering and its benefits for space missions. Guided by ESA experts, the students learnt to use the Open Concurrent Design Tool and identified design drivers. Divided into teams, they first created a subsystem concept to later achieve an already identified mission concept, function tree and product tree, using concurrent engineering. With this, students also contributed to beta-testing and improving ESA Academy Concurrent Design Facility (CDF) tools, whose development is under finalisation.  

Schedule:

Day 1 Introduction to the Mission and Concurrent Engineering
Get familiar with Workbooks and OCDT
Mission overview and Trade-Off
Mission and System Modes Definition 
Day 2 First iteration of all Subsystems.
Modify Workbooks
First Budgets
Presentations of the first results 
Day 3 Finalization of the Concept
Product tree
Budgets
Presentation of the second iteration
ESA Redu Centre Visit
Day 4 Final Design Consolidation & any Open Issues
Preparing the Final Presentation
Final Presentations 
 
 

ESA/ELGRA Gravity-Related Research Summer School 2016
27 June-2 July 2016

Statuscall for applications closed; training course delivered

Description: The aim of this Summer School was to promote gravity-related research amongst future scientists and engineers and attract them to its multiple research opportunities available in the space sector. During this week, students had the opportunity to attend lectures, explaining the wide range of applications and advantages of performing life and physical sciences research at different gravity levels. Students learnt about the several existing platforms available for this type of research: from parabolic flights, to the human centrifuge, to the International Space Station (ISS). Students got the chance to work in small groups to come up with ideas for possible gravity-related experiments.

Schedule Overview:

Day 1 Introduction to ESA, ESA programmes and opportunities
Introduction to ELGRA and SELGRA
Introduction to gravity-related research
ESA Education Office and hands-on programmes
Team project
Visit of Redu Centre
Day 2 Life science research
Physiology research
Visit of Euro Space Centre
Day 3 Physical science research
Develop a gravity-related experiment
Team project
Day 4 Space project life cycle
Former student projects
Project management
Visit of Centre Spatial de Liège
Team project
Day 5 Team project presentations
 
 

ESA Hands-on experiment projects training week 2016
14-17 March 2016

Statustraining course delivered

Description:  The aim of this training week was to better prepare selected student teams for their participation in the ESA Academy Hands-on Space Projects’ Drop Your Thesis! and Spin Your Thesis! programmes, by providing them with the information and basic knowledge that they is required to design, develop, test, and perform a gravity-related scientific experiment or technology demonstration. The idea was to optimise the transfer of know-how and expertise from the experts in the field to the students, before their experiment campaigns, through lectures, workshops and meetings with the experts. Hence, the objective was to increase the quality of collected data and the success rate of the students’ hands-on projects.

Schedule Overview:

Day 1 Introduction to ESA, ESA programmes and opportunities
Student teams presentations
Develop a scientific experiment
SELGRA
Physical sciences at different g levels
Day 2 Life sciences at different g levels
Human Physiology at different g levels
Former student projects
Meet your experts (session 1)
Day 3 Meet your experts (session 2)
Visit of Redu Centre
System Engineering workshop
Day 4 Project and Risk Management workshop
Experiment Automation workshop
Outreach Workshop
Inspirational lecture
Visit of Euro Space Centre