Post-Alpbach Summer School Event 2022 enhances Venus mission

The aim of the event was to learn about and use the Concurrent Engineering approach to enhance the design of the Magnetospheric Venus Space Explorers (MVSE) mission initially designed by one of the student teams during the Alpbach Summer School. On-hand to offer guidance were a full team of experts, including two ESA Systems Engineers, the former Head of ESA Science Support Office, an engineering and a scientific tutor from the Alpbach Summer School 2022.

"I had a wonderful experience accompanying the students, from the development of their first mission concept for the "Magnetospheric Venus Space Explorers Mission" (MVSE) in the course of the Alpbach Summer School 2022, to their maturing of it into a detailed mission design concept at the Post-Alpbach Summer School Event”, explained Konstanze Fila from FFG. “It was amazing to observe how the students worked together with great enthusiasm and motivation using the Concurrent Engineering approach to achieve the final consolidation of their mission concept with the support of their tutors and the ESA experts.”

MVSE itself is an ambitious hypothetical mission to study the induced magnetosphere of Venus, which forms when the solar wind interacts with particles in the Venusian ionosphere. MVSE would use three spacecraft, each in a different region of the magnetosphere, to measure changes to the magnetosphere’s structure and variations in the heating process during events such as solar flares - phenomena which are not fully understood by scientists.

The students were divided into teams of two or three, each responsible for the design of different aspects of the mission, including Structures, Propulsion, and Trajectory Analysis, and were taught to use the Concurrent Model-based Engineering Tool (COMET) – the same software used in real mission studies at ESA’s Concurrent Design Facility. Over three days, each team discussed and iterated their designs to constantly improve them and ensure they met the mission and scientific objectives. The Concurrent Engineering method proved very useful, enabling problems to be identified and solved quickly by good communication between the teams.

The students were very enthusiastic, and conversations often continued late into the evenings. “It was really encouraging to work on the Concurrent Engineering approach with dedicated experts from ESA's CDF facility. This way, the event wasn't just feeling like a student exercise, but as a condensed experience of the real thing,” said a German student from Technische Universität Braunschweig.

On the final evening, the designs were frozen and the students had the chance to visit the Euro Space Centre to relax after a busy week of working. The next morning, they presented their mission concept to a panel of professionals, noting how the design had improved considerably thanks to the Concurrent Engineering approach. To conclude the Event, the students were able to chat informally with ESEC professionals over a well-deserved cup of coffee and tour ESEC-Redu.

Before their departure, ESA and FFG encouraged the students to keep working on their mission concept and submit an abstract to an international conference and/or a paper to a scientific journal!

The theme for the Alpbach Summer School 2023 will be “Exoplanets: Understanding alien worlds in diverse environments” and the call for applications will be launched in the middle of January 2023. If you are interested in joining, visit https://www.summerschoolalpbach.at/.

To find more information on upcoming ESA Academy training sessions and opportunities, please visit https://www.esa.int/Education/ESA_Academy/Current_opportunities

For enquiries, contact tlp@esa.int