ESEO Student Teams
During the preliminary design phase of ESEO (the so-called Phase B), students from 13 universities across Europe were involved, and benefitted from learning in practice about the first phases of a space mission design . At the end of this phase, the project was re-oriented to fit into a smaller spacecraft, and a new Prime Contractor (Sitael, former ALMASpace) was selected by ESA to provide and test the ESEO satellite, and to support the student teams together with ESA itself. Today, students from 10 universities are involved in ESEO, and their contributions to the mission are:
Student payloads overview:
University of Surrey (UK) – Amateur Radio Unit (AMSAT)
The AMSAT team is composed of four students from the University of Surrey and two radio amateurs collaborating with the Surrey Space Centre. They are developing a communications unit for VHF downlink, to provide connection to a global ground station network of students and amateur radio users around the world.
Status: Proto Flight model under test
Tartu Observatory (Estonia) – Micro Camera
The CAM team is composed of two MSc students, one PhD student, and three MSc graduates. They are providing a digital camera with two independent sets of optics to take pictures of the Earth: one to be used for taking pictures at a wide angle, and one for high resolution images.
Status: Proto Flight model delivered
Cranfield University (UK) – De-Orbiting Mechanism
The DOM team is composed of one PhD student, one MSc student, and one Bachelor student from the University of Cranfield, UK. They are developing a deployable sail, which will increase the atmospheric drag and force the re-entry and burn-up of the satellite in the Earth’s atmosphere.
Status: Proto Flight model delivered
Hungarian Academy of Science (Hungary) – TRITEL Telescope Dosimeter
The TRITEL team consists of two PhD students, four MSc Students, and one BSc student. They are developing a 3D-dosimeter for ESEO to measure the dynamic radiation above the Earth’s atmosphere.
Status: Proto Flight model delivered
Budapest University of Technology (Hungary) – Langmuir Probe (Plasma Diagnostic Experiment) and Power Distribution Unit
The LMP team is composed of 1 PhD, 2 MSc and 4 BSc students from Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary, studying electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and physics. They are implementing an experiment for the ESEO platform, enabling measurements of plasma anomalies and geomagnetic disturbances.
Status: Proto Flight model under test
The PDU team is composed of 1 PhD, 3 MSc and 2 BSc electrical engineering students from the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary. The team is developing and building ESEO’s Power Distribution and Protection Module of the Electrical Power Subsystem.
Status: Proto Flight model under test
University of Technology of Wroclaw (Poland) – S-band Communication Subsystem
The team is composed of 4 MSc students, 1 BSc student, 6 supervising professors and a research assistant. They are providing an S-Band patch antenna to transmit data from all of ESEO’s experiments to the ground station.
Status: Proto Flight model under test
Delft University of Technology (Netherlands) – ADE S/W Experiments
The team is composed of two MSc students and an associate professor. They develop the Attitude Determination Experiment (ADE) software capable to estimate the attitude of the satellite by four different algorithms running in parallel.
Status: Final software version delivered
University of Bologna (Italy) – GPS Receiver and Orbit Determination
The GPS team consists of a PhD research assistant, a PhD student candidate, and an MSc student. Their experiment will test real-time GPS-based positioning for LEO satellites, using a Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) single frequency receiver and advanced estimation algorithmsdeveloped by the students.
Status: Proto Flight model delivered
Ground Segment
University of Bologna (Italy)
The ground station team at the University of Bologna, Italy, consists of one PhD student. The goal is to set up a primary ground station to monitor and control the ESEO spacecraft, and a secondary ground station to download scientific payload data. This includes the handling of commands and telemetry data as well as establishing a mission control system.
Status: Ground station validation phase on-going
University of Vigo (Spain) – GENSO – Ground station for ESEO
The team is a collaboration between Vigo University, Spain, and California Polytechnic State University, USA. It is composed of two professors and three students. The Ground Station in Vigo will be used as an alternative to the main one in Italy. A software called SatNet, which will enable remote operations, is being developed along with researchers from the California Polytechnic State University.
Status: Ground station validation phase on-going
University of Technology in Munich (Germany) – S-band Ground Station
The team is composed of three PhD candidates, five MSc and two BSc students of the University of Technology in Munich, Germany. They are setting up, maintaining and operating the ground station for receiving the data from ESEO’s experiments.
Status: Ground station validation phase on-going
For further information, contact:
Piero Galeone, Head of the Tertiary Education Unit - Piero.Galeone @ esa.int