Development of deep-space optical communication systems (DOCS) poses a number of technical challenges as compared to conventional radio-frequency links. The higher energy of a single quantum (a photon) at the optical carrier frequency implies the need for dedicated modulation formats and receiver designs. The current technical standard for efficient DOCS is pulse position modulation (PPM) format combined with direct detection (DD) which for photon-starved links is implemented as photon counting.

The use of higher frequencies is becoming necessary for supporting feeder links of High Throughput Telecom Satellites due to the larger bandwidths available. Q and V bands are now being considered as a baseline for next generation systems. The next step will be to look at W band. In order to understand the system sizing, it is necessary to have a good modelling of the propagation channel. So far no measurement campaign has been done, therefore it is needed to start characterizing the channel.

Despite different attempts performed in the past two decades, Europe is lacking a competitive product for a large reflector with the requested TRL level to embark on a commercial program. Need is identified to cover antenna applications from 4 up to 18 meter and for frequencies from UHF up to Ka band.. American companies are leaders in this domain and are commercially dominating the worldwide market.

Metallic Glasses (MG) are a class of alloys which retain an amorphous structure in the solid state, when cooled from the liquid state. Formation of a fully amorphous structure for large cross sections (up to > 1 cm) is now possible for several alloying systems referred to as Bulk Metallic Glasses (e.g. Fe-base, Ti-base, Al-base, Mg-base, Ca-base, Zr-base).

Metallic Glasses (MG) are a class of alloys which retain an amorphous structure in the solid state, when cooled from the liquid state. Formation of a fully amorphous structure for large cross sections (up to > 1 cm) is now possible for several alloying systems referred to as Bulk Metallic Glasses (e.g. Fe-base, Ti-base, Al-base, Mg-base, Ca-base, Zr-base).

The current state of the art for bi-propellant propulsion systems employed by telecom spacecraft is to have a gas regulated system to maintain the propellant feed pressure in the propellant tanks for the Apogee engine burn. For on-station the pressure in the propellant tank is allowed to decay over life (aka blowdown) and thus the thruster propellant inlet pressure (and hence thruster performance) decays over time. Recently a number of different pump concepts have been proposed to improve the performance of propulsion launcher systems.

SpaceWire has become a de facto standard for payload systems (including for Command & Control) and its Real-Time derivatives are now being considered for avionics. The capability provided by SpaceWire to develop data handling systems based on high-speed networks allows much greater performance but implies implementing communication bus management techniques specific to SpaceWire. As network management is not part of the basic SpaceWire protocol ECSS-E-ST-50-12C (Rev.1), it must be provided to industry in the form of an additional standard.