Nebula Public Library

Electrical, Electronic and Electro-mechanical (EEE) components play an essential role in the functional performance, quality, life cycle and costs of space systems. EEE components are fundamental building blocks of any spacecraft and major drivers in determining their performances. Guaranteeing access to EEE components able to provide the necessary performances to comply with the requirements of future satellite missions is of paramount importance to maintain a successful and autonomous satellite manufacturing capabilities.

Model based approaches have proved to be efficient in supporting engineering activities, models replacing traditional document-based approaches. Nevertheless even in most advanced deployments, a lot of engineering artifacts are textual either because the return on investment of introducing models is too low on this particular case or because the information is more efficiently expressed in natural language even if consistency and correctness issues appears.

The objective of Fluidics experiment is in the first instance to validate the behavior of fluids predicted by computational tools and a priori models in a controlled long duration microgravity environment. From the technological perspective objective of the experiment addresses issues relative to the slosh of fluids during specific spacecraft and satellites maneuvers. The more fundamental objective aims at observing capillary wave turbulence on the surface of a fluid layer in a low-gravity environment in order to be able to correct the physics assumed in computational tools.

For decades humans have been producing plastic materials and this production has never ceased growing to a point that, due to waste mismanagement, a global environmental issue has been generated. One of the most mediatic manifestations of such a pollution is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP), an area in the North Pacific ocean with higher density of macro and microplastic representing between three and six times the size of France .