People, Companies and Agencies we’ve been collaborating with.
ARGOTEC
Argotec is an Italian aerospace company specializing in the design, development, and operation of space systems and payloads. Founded in 2008 and headquartered in Turin, Italy, Argotec has emerged as a key player in Europe’s space industry.
Lesath International
Lesath International Inc has a unique motto, “Connecting Humanity and Space.” Could you elaborate on the inspiration behind this motto and how it aligns with the company’s mission in the space industry?
Connecting Humanity & Space is a result of opening up rapid and cost effective access to space inspired by the notion that humanity has to extend to the stars to evolve into a more technological advanced race.
Virtus Solis
John Bucknell – The world needs clean, inexpensive and reliable power.
Can you tell us about the inspiration behind starting Virtus Solis Technologies and the mission of your company?
Virtus Solis’s mission is to solve energy for everyone for ever. Energy underlies everything in modern society, with those of us in the West averaging 9kW total energy and the worldwide average at 1.8kW – implying that most of the world is in energy poverty. Making energy cost low enough to allow scale up the supply to offer affordable energy to the levels the rich West enjoys is an admirable goal. Space Based Solar …
Michael Callari – MAIA Space
Thanks to Dr. Raphaël Chevrier, Head of Communications at MaiaSpace, the SpaceInfo Club had the opportunity to interview Michael Callari, Chief Business Officer at MaiaSpace. Enjoy the read!
The fact that reusability and sustainability are at the core of the MaiaSpace culture and embedded in the design since Day 1 is also completely aligned with my own vision and values around space activities. Last but not least, I am totally convinced with the core strategy of MaiaSpace to combine European heritage technology – we will use Prometheus engines developed by our mother company ArianeGroup since 2014 – with its own agile and innovative processes and culture of risk in a winning combination.
AIRBUS Space
In this episode of the SpaceInfo Podcast we look inside one of the biggest and most active Company in the Space Sector: Airbus Space @airbusds Thanks to Gunn Schweickert, Sentinel 2C project manager and Remi Bellouard, project manager of the MSI instrument we’ll talk about how the Copernicus Program and the Sentinel constellation will shape the future of Earth Observation!
Alexandra Dolce Esquire
Alexandra is currently working as Senior Legal Consultant for the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) Procurement Department. She is a very expert and a reference point in her field. Recently she has also joined the ‘For All Moonkind’s’ Institute on Space Law and Ethics and today she will tell us something about Space and Law!
Alexandra is currently working as Senior Legal Consultant for the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) Procurement Department. She is a very expert and a reference point in her field. Recently she has also joined the ‘For All Moonkind’s’ Institute on Space Law and Ethics and today she will tell us something about Space and Law!
Benjamin Ogden
Professor of Strategic Space Studies, NPEC Space Policy Fellowship Alumnus, MIT Lincoln Labs Defense Technology Seminar Alumnus: for sure he is not short of credentials and this interview will be worth your reading!
The SpaceInfo Club had the honor to ask mr Ogden some questions about his current job as Professor of Strategic Space Studies as well as his long path in the U.S. Army giving us a unique view on the importance of Space nowadays. Here are some questions, don’t forget to join the members club, which is free, to get the full interview inside the next editions of the Magazine!
Dante Galli
A New Era for Space Exploration
The SpaceInfo Club had the pleasure to ask him some questions. Mr Galli has been part of the European Space Agency for almost ten years and after working on the Vega-C launcher, he’s now the programme manager for one of the most advanced Space programs nowadays: The Space Rider. Enjoy the read!
Finally end-2020 I joined the Space Rider Programme as Space Segment Manager, responsible for all the development and qualification activities of the Space Rider vehicle.
And since January 2022 I’m the Space Rider Programme Manager, in the ESA Directorate of Space Transportation, responsible for the full development of the system: space segment, ground segment and landing site.
David Evans
Mr Evans is a reference point at the European Space Agency when Satellite Operations come into play
I started my ESOC career in 1992, when I joined the EURECA mission. It was six months before launch and there was a major problem with the mission planning system which was based primarily on manual data entry. With 15 experiments, all having different constraints and each having multiple operations per day, it was impossible to use the system operationally. All the other flight control team members were focussed on preparing for the approaching launch, so another colleague and I were left without help or budget. We ended up solving the problem by writing thousands of lines of code of our office PCs to produce the perfect plan before it was entered into the “official” planning system.
Dr Adriana Thomé
Senior Technologist at the International Cooperation Office of the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation in Brazil and 2023 UNOOSA Space for Women Mentor.
As a 2023 UNOOSA Space for Women Mentor, how do you see the role of mentorship in promoting gender equality and inclusivity in the field of space science and technology? Can you highlight any specific initiatives or success stories?
I consider mentorship to be an important tool in the search for gender equality and inclusivity in science and technology, as it provides direct career counselling from a more experienced professional to young professionals. This plays an important role in the encouragement of the mentees in regard to difficulties they can suffer in the beginning of their professional lives, enhancing the chance of their permanence and eventual success in the career. Besides, mentorship also enables these young professionals to be inserted to a network of connections in the sector that would usually take a long time for them to achieve on their own. In this specific topic I want to highlight the conquest of one of my mentees.
Giuseppe Cataldo
New Worlds
with the James Webb Space Telescope by NASA’s JPL Scientist Giuseppe Cataldo
SpaceInfo had the great pleasure to meet Giuseppe Cataldo, who worked, among other amazing projects, on the James Webb Space Telescope. The following article was written by him.
Nearly a year ago, on July 12, 2022, the entire world stood amazed before the first images and data revealed by the largest and most powerful space telescope in human history, James Webb. A project twenty-five years in the making, James Webb has stood to the expectations of the engineers who designed and built it, the scientists who had been looking forward to using such a sophisticated machine to make impactful discoveries, and all the astronomy fans who could not wait any longer to admire details of the universe as never seen before.
Matthew Greenhouse
Hunt for Exoplanets
Matthew Greenhouse has served on the James Webb Space Telescope senior staff as Project Scientist for the Webb science instrument payload since the very beginning: 1997. At the SpaceInfo Club we had the honor to ask him some questions: enjoy the journey through these amazing experiences!
I began my journey in geology, earning my degree from the University of Arizona. Afterward, I ventured into planetary geology and eventually transitioned into astrophysics. Pursuing my passion further, I completed my PhD in Physics at the University of Wyoming. Following that, I embarked on postdoctoral positions at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC as a Federal Civil Service astrophysicist, and after some time in Europe I completed my journey at the Goddard Space Flight Center. In 1997, I joined the James Webb Space Telescope project right from its inception.
Muriel Hooghe
As a senior project manager at the Luxembourg Space Agency, Dr Hooghe gives us valuable insights in what’s happening
We recently had the pleasure to ask Dr Hooghe some questions about her job at the Luxembourg Space Agency and here are some of them. Join the members club – for free – and access the full editions of the SpaceInfo Magazine to read the full interview inside the next publications!
After finishing my PhD in Physics, I got a job with SES. It was a bit by chance as my background wasn’t in space (my PhD was in non-linear phenomena), but the job required good physics, maths, mechanics, and software skills, and it sounded exciting. I wasn’t disappointed: my new ‘space job’ was in the Flight Dynamics section that is responsible for station-keeping (i.e manoeuvring for orbital control) of the SES satellites. At that time, SES only had 6 satellites. We were also responsible for the development of the tools (software) for the station-keeping, and over the years we developed and automated the processes be able to control a fleet of over 50 satellites with a team that wasn’t much larger than when I started. So basically, that’s how I grew ‘roots’ in the space sector. Over time I moved internally in SES to work on Contingency Planning, and then in Frequency Coordination.
Nicholas Brennan
Spacewalk Operations, means Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Instructor and Flight Controller
The SpaceInfo Club had the pleasure to ask Nicholas Brennan some questions about his job at NASA: he is currently working as Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Instructor and Flight Controller, plus he has been part of the US Navy as EOD Platoon Commander for the Special Operations Force. This presentation is just a preview of what you’ll see inside the next editoins of the SpaceInfo Magazine, so make sure to join the club!
I know first-hand how difficult it is to think clearly and how easy it is to get frustrated when you are uncomfortable like that. These experiences influence both the degree of detail I write into procedures as a flight controller, and the level of comfort in doing a task I look for as an instructor.
Oksana Korda
She’s a very brilliant photographer and artist and she is sharing her view of our universe through the eyes of an artist: her digital creations are just amazing! We are very happy to have Oksana Korda among the members of the SpaceInfo Club!
The following article has been written by Oksana Korda.
One day I went down to the center of one of the volcanic craters. I was sitting there completely alone, in a place that existed millions of years before me and probably will be there millions of years after me. Not a soul around for a mile. Quiet. Where else can one think of eternity? All those profound questions that have been asked for millennia, started popping up in my head… What is the nature of the Universe? Is the destiny of humankind bound to Earth? Are we and our planet unique? Is there life elsewhere in the Universe?
Paolo Ferri
40 years on the edge of Space
The SpaceInfo Club had the huge pleasure to interview Paolo Ferri, who’s been working at the European Space Agency for almost forty years. He started his career at ESA inside Spacecraft Operations for Eureca Mission and then became the Operations Manager for Rosetta Mission. After that he became responsible for mission operations preparation and execution for all ESA missions to the solar system as Head of the Solar and Planetary Mission Division. In the last eight years in the Agency he was Head of the Mission Operations Department and concluded his path at ESA as a Senior Advisor. He is now member of multiple advisory boards, lecturer and Chair of the System Engineering Qualification (Space) Review Board at Airbus Defense and Space.
To sum up: for sure he doesn’t need any presentation. Here is what we had the pleasure to ask him, have a good read!
In 40 years work in the field of Space Operations there where many highlights, as you can imagine. I’ll to talk about two missions which were very important in my career: Eureca and Rosetta.
Rosetta was not only a historical and very successful mission. It was also the start of the interplanetary adventure for ESA. Thanks to the infrastructure we designed and developed, to the expertise we built and the experiences we made, today ESA is flying missions to the Sun, to Mercury, to Mars and even to Jupiter. And the operations leaders of these missions are all coming from the Rosetta team.
IRIDE
SpaceInfo Club had the great pleasure to meet part of the IRIDE Team and the following are a few questions we made to Engineer Marco Casucci, who is responsible for the increase of adoption of Earth Observation in Local Public Administration under the IRIDE Project.
In the context of the NextGenerationEU program, under which lies the Italian National Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PNRR), the Italian Government funded the IRIDE project. Thanks to its great ability and experience over the past decades, ESA was delegated by the Italian Government to develop, both under the contractual and technical point of view, the IRIDE Project together with the support of the Italian Space Agency (ASI).
Sent Into Space
Sent Into Space’s work includes global marketing stunts, space cinematography for documentary and cinema, scientific research, aerospace research and development, educational projects and even ash scattering memorial services! Regulated by the UK Civil Aviation Authority and with fully public liability insurance, they are unrivaled in their launch record!
If you ever though about launching something into space like a product of your company, a special device you designed or just sending a message with an outstanding view, you will probably turn into this company.
Sent Into Space is a marketing-focused space agency, perhaps the first of its kind in the world. We use lighter-than-air platforms to travel to the upper stratosphere, in the region of Near Space, for business and consumer clients across a variety of industries.
Meganne Christian
Member of the ESA Astronauts Reserve, we asked her some questions
SpaceInfo Club had the pleasure to ask her some questions, here are some!
Born in Kent, England to New Zealand parents, she moved at the age of five to Wollongong, Australia. At young age, she already showed her talent for scientific subjects, being part of the school’s 2002 international championship team of Future Problem Solving Program International.
In 2009 she received a a Bachelor of Engineering and the university medal in industrial chemistry, at the University of New South Wales. Going on with her passion for chemistry and material science, in 2011 was awarded with the Heinz Harant award and received her doctorate in 2014 researching on hydrogen storage with borohydrides. In 2022 she received her Italian citizenship, but was already studying in Bologna after her doctorate, in particular at the Institute of Microelectronics and Microsystems (IMM) at the National Research Council of Italy (CNR).Another important step in her career was holding the role of atmospheric physicist and meteorologist at the Concordia Station located in Antarctic, in 2019.
Nicola Winter
In November 2022, she was selected as a member of the ESA astronaut reserve… but this is just the apex of an already incredible career! As a pilot she has accumulated more than 2350 flying hours and holds commercial pilot, military pilot, helicopter and aerobatic licenses, is a certified flight instructor and trained in hang-gliding.
SpaceInfo had the huge pleasure to interview Nicola Winter, here are some questions we asked her, if you want read the full article just log in your Member Account.
When did you decided you wanted to be an astronaut and what was the event or the person that made you think about being an astronaut?
Ever since I was a kid, I loved Star Trek and its pioneering spirit – to go where no one has gone before. That’s exactly what I want to do. Then I became a fighter pilot at Sheppard AFB in Texas, USA. They have an alumni hall of fame there. Every day I walked by a bunch of Astronauts who had been on the exact same path, I was on. That was when I decided to go for it for real.
Sascha Wenzel
The Age of Man in Space
We write the year 2023 according to the Christian calendar, the year 1444 according to the Islamic calendar, the year 5783 according to the Jewish calendar or the year 4720 according to the Chinese calendar. There are almost countless ages characterized by different levels of development of the many unique cultures and humanity as a whole. For this to happen, Homo sapiens had to conquer the planet piece by piece around 120,000 years ago, just out of its infancy on the largest continent on earth. Our species has managed to adapt to almost all climatic conditions and thus expand its habitat across the entire world.
Shauna Anderson
Neuroscience applied to Space. Today we’ll se how many connections there are between Space and Neuroscience!
Among the huge number of things Shauns does in her life, she found the time to answer some questions that we made her. She is a Researcher in multiple realities (BioLife Health Center, CRPS Warriors Foundation, Arizona State University), co-founder at The North Winds and team leader at the Arizona Cancer Evolution Center-
She covered very important positions in the past as well, being among the others, Strategic Advisor for the U.S. Presidential Campaign; but everything started in the US Army.
Tommaso Sgobba
Tommaso Sgobba stands at the forefront of space safety leadership as the President and cofounder of the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS), a global organization uniting premier space safety experts.
Here just a preview of the first question… join the club to read the full interview!
Tommaso Sgobba stands at the forefront of space safety leadership as the President and cofounder of the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS), a global organization uniting premier space safety experts.
With a wealth of experience, Tommaso held a pivotal role in ensuring flight safety at the European Space Agency (ESA), and NASA. Having commenced his career in the aeronautical industry, mr Sgobba joined ESA in 1989. Over the years, he transitioned into roles of increasing responsibility, eventually becoming the product assurance and safety manager for European manned missions on the Shuttle, MIR station, and the European facilities for the International Space Station.
He has significantly contributed to the field through numerous publications, including coediting the groundbreaking textbook “Safety Design for Space Systems” and the book “The Need for an Integrated Regulatory Regime for Aviation and Space.” Tommaso’s dedication has not only shaped ESA’s safety protocols but has also left an indelible mark on the global landscape of space safety.