UKPF Early Careers Meeting 2026

On the 9th January 2026, the Centre for Planetary Sciences at UCL/Birkbeck (CPS) hosted the UK Planetary Forum Early Careers Meeting (UKPF ECM) to bring together the UK’s community of planetary science early-career researchers (ECRs) for a day of research sharing and networking. 

The event, which took place at the Birkbeck Clore Management Centre in Bloomsbury, London, attracted 126 attendees from across the UK with over 100 people in person and up to 25 online, representing almost 40 different institutions.  This was a fantastic turnout, particularly given the unfortunate timing of Storm Goretti hitting the UK that day, which affected travel for some. Attendees were also able to attend virtually to view talks and take part in the Q&A if they were not able to make it in person. 

The meeting programme consisted of 25 research talks and 30 research posters by ECRs, across 6 themes: Planetary Geology and Geochemistry, Exploration and Instrumentation, Atmospheres and Magnetospheres, Planetary Habitability and Astrobiology, Exoplanets, and Small Bodies and Impacts. Keynote talks were given by Professor Sara Russell from the Natural History Museum, who spoke about NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Mission to asteroid Bennu and the future of sample return, and by Professor Emma Bunce, Director of the Institute for Space at the University of Leicester, who gave a talk about missions to explore ‘Ocean Worlds’, including the ESA JUICE mission to visit the moons of Jupiter. Both speakers were hugely inspiring, also spending time at the meeting to listen to other talks and chat with the ECRs. There was plenty of opportunity for networking and socialising during the breaks, lunch and closing reception.

New to the UKPF ECM this year, was a Community Updates session, where our sponsors and other relevant organisations had the opportunity to present brief, informative updates to the ECR community. These included the UKPF; the Royal Astronomical Society to highlight their Early Careers Network; the UK Space Agency, represented by Meganne Christian, UKSA Exploration Commercialisation Lead and ESA Astronaut Reserve; the Astrobiology Society of Britain; the Orbyts project, which partners ECRs with secondary schools; and a representative for the recently launched NASA SciX platform. The RAS also hosted a membership stand.

We are delighted that the meeting was able to provide a welcoming and supportive environment for the ECRs to share research with their peers and make important and long-lasting connections, which will hopefully help to build a stronger UK planetary and geoscience community. Details of future UKPF Early Careers Meetings will be announced on the UKPF website.

The 2026 meeting organisation was led by Jo Fabbri (UCL-CPS) and Karen-Anne Devoil (UCL-CPS/UKPF) with a team of 16 ECR-volunteers from the CPS, and support from CPS academic staff and the UK Planetary Forum.

The successful delivery of the meeting this year was hugely dependent on the funding grants we received. We are very grateful to our sponsors, the Royal Astronomical Society and the UK Space Agency, for their generous awards, which enabled travel and (child) care grants to be awarded, ensuring a successful event with maximum participation from our planetary science ECR community. 

Links

• UK Planetary Forum - Free membership sign-up
• 19th UKPF Early Careers Meeting 2026 webpage

Images

• Hero image: Group photo of UKPF ECM 2026 attendees in Birkbeck lecture theatre. Credit: Huma Irfan.
• Gallery: Selection of photos from the event. See captions.