This work begins the material selection process for EVA suits based on initial inputs from the EAC team that is developing an ergonomic prototype space suit.

Passive intermodulation is a real threat to all types of payloads. In some cases, it could even lead to total lost of the spaceship. Despite of this, there is very weak understanding of the parameters that generate this unwanted interference as well as their influence in the amplitude of the interfering signal. In addition, there is a total lack of agreed testing techniques, procedures and methodologies as well as justified test margins, as has already been recently stated by the European community (National Delegations, satellite operators and Eurospace).

Aerobraking phase of ENVISION is critical in terms of duration and required operations. One limitation during aerobraking is the temperature reached on Multi Layer Insulation (MLI) due to the aerothermal heat flux.MLIs can withstand during short durations (intermittent exposure) higher temperatures than their steady state qualification temperature.

The interest of having in the near future an available Position, Navigation and Timing (PNT) service supporting future missions to and at the Moon is currently supported by both institutional and commercial initiatives. On the commercial side, multiple companies are developing business solutions targeting the Moon and several major European companies are proposing to team up to build a communications network on the Moon compatible to terrestrial standards. In parallel, NASA has recently announced its plans to a ?Return to the moon?

All satellites must have the ability to correct for the high rotational tip-off rates after initial release from the launch vehicle. On current navigation satellites, de-tumbling is usually achieved in short duration using the onboard chemical propulsion thrusters. With future Navigation satellites looking at using all-electric propulsion satellites, these manouevres are to be performed by xenon-fed auxiliary thrusters. COTS (xenon cold gas) auxiliary thrusters are limited in the max thrust level provided and the de-tumbling duration, in the absence of chemical thrusters, is a concern.

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.