The “16U4SBSP” mission concept is a fundamental technology demonstration step for the realization of kW-/MW-/GW-scale Space-Based Solar Power (SBSP) based on flight formation, a distributed or aggregated swarm of small satellites contrary to conventional concepts of monolithic giant SBSP satellites. In this mission, a swarm of 16U CubeSats collaboratively supply wireless power via Radio-Frequency waves to end-users in different locations on the ground, for instance to provide backup power for emergency situations, and also for space-to-space commercial use-cases.

The challenge in space data acquisition, e.g. for earth observation, lies in limited data-downlink capacity. Advances in onboard processing technology prompt exploration of deploying edge computing on satellites to alleviate data transport issues. This can be achieved through individual satellites or specialized networks akin to public cloud data centres. Use-case evaluation and stakeholder validation shaped system requirements for a generic Space Data Centre (SDC) architecture that was devised and simulated in Excel, integrating technology roadmaps and user needs.

RaCERS is a swarm of eight small satellites that will fly in close formation to exploit the enormous power of cooperating radars to boost the quantity and resolution of environmental observations from space. This will transform the science of Earth environmental monitoring and forecasting applied to such vital concerns as severe weather, natural hazards, snow/ice cover, soil moisture, vegetation canopy, surface winds, ocean circulation and much more.

Key challenges for solar fuel technologies to become viable and widely deployed are their durability and cost. These challenges directly relate to the semiconductor-electrolyte (SE) interface inherent to traditional photoelectrochemical (PEC) approaches and to the low energy density of solar radiation (~1000 W/m2) and its stochastic and cyclic nature, requiring large processing areas with idle waiting time (i.e. low capacity factors).

The modulation of cold atom experiments currently uses bulky laser sources, wavelength converters and electro- or acousto-optic modulators to achieve high power and large extinction ratio at wavelengths close to the visible range. Here, we propose to exploit the lithium niobate-on-insulator (LNOI) platform to integrate an electro-optic modulator (EOM) with a periodically poled lithium niobate (PPLN) building block on the same photonic chip to maximize the available power and modulation depth.

MICOR system was successfully assembled at Menhir Photonics and final tests performed at CSEM. The tests demonstrated the impressive noise performance of the device. The following main results have been achieved:

This project aim was to make steps towards a demonstrator for a fully stabilized frequency comb, with the ultimate goal of creating a space-grade version. Such a system is essential for advancing timing and frequency distribution in space technology and enhancing Galileo satellites. Transitioning from electronics to photonics promises to significantly boost the accuracy and precision of satellite clocks, leading to heightened data transfer security, improved telecom performance, resistance to jamming, and more accurate greenhouse gases detection.

The main objective of this activity was to design and develop an innovative virtual lab for Mars experiments, where AI methods are used to improve orbital imagery resolution, as well to obtain terrain features based on local images from rovers. Two different methods were used to recreate the virtual environment. The first one was dedicated to process low resolution images from orbital information. The main contribution in this sense was the use of AI to increase the resolution of these images.