Events & News with UCL Space Domain
One O'clock Lectures
10 May 2022

Date: 10 May 2022
Time: 13:00 - 14:00 BST
This is a zoom meeting. For the link contact s.plattard@ucl.ac.uk
Speaker: Professor Marek Ziebart, Professor of Space Geodecy, UCL.
Position, navigation and timing derived from satellite systems have evolved steadily from the early days of the 1970s into an embedded and pervasive technology upon which major elements of civilian, military and scientific infrastructure rely. Did you know that global financial transactions rely upon GPS to provide timing information at the level of a millionth of a second? That low earth orbiting satellites can be positioned to an accuracy of 1cm on orbit by using GNSS? Emerging challenges like driverless vehicles, space traffic management and drone-based technologies present new requirements for safety of operation, accuracy and continuity of service. Our increasing reliance on all this also provides opportunities for criminals and divisive regimes to wreak havoc on the world. How can we protect ourselves against this? Please tune in, and contribute to the discussion as well.
Marek Ziebart is Professor of Space Geodesy at University College London. He has worked for over twenty years with NASA, ESA, the US Air Force and the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory on various aspects of space technology. He developed international standards for flight dynamics of GNSS spacecraft used routinely by space agencies and research institutes such as MIT, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre. He was a recent co-author of the UK government Blackett Review on PNT resilience and a USAF academy book on Space Domain Awareness.
16 May 2022

Scaling Life in Space
Date: 16 May 2022
Time: 13:00 - 14:00 BST
This is a zoom meeting. For the link contact s.plattard@ucl.ac.uk
Speaker: Dr Ariel Ekblaw, Director, MIT Space Exploration Initiative
Ariel Ekblaw is the founder and Director of the MIT Space Exploration Initiative (SEI), a team of over 50 graduate students, staff, and faculty actively prototyping the artifacts of our sci-fi space future. Founded in 2016, the Initiative includes a portfolio of 40+ research projects focused on opening access to life in space, and supports an accelerator-like R&D program for payload development and spaceflight testing across MIT and many outreach communities. For the Initiative, Ariel drives space-related research across science, engineering, art, and design, and leads an annually recurring cadence of parabolic flights, sub-orbital launches, and missions to the International Space Station. Ariel graduated with a B.S. in Physics, Mathematics and Philosophy from Yale University and designed a novel space architecture habitat for her MIT PhD in autonomously self-assembling space structures.
24 May 2022

BRAIN IN SPACE: How altered gravity influences human behaviour.
Date: 24 May 2022
Time: 13:00 - 14:00 BST
This is a zoom meeting. For the link contact s.plattard@ucl.ac.uk
Speaker: Dr Elisa Rafaella Ferre, Seniour Lecturer, Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck University London
Dr Elisa Raffaella Ferre is an Experimental Psychologist and Cognitive Neuroscientist. She completed a BSc and a MSc in Psychology at the Università degli Studi di Pavia (Italy) where she also obtained a PhD in Psychology in 2012 for the investigation of multisensory integration between vestibular, somatosensory and visual function in humans. She was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London (UK) from 2012 to 2015. Dr Ferre took up her first faculty position at Royal Holloway University of London (UK) in 2015. Since September 2021, she is a Senior Lecturer and Director of the Vestibular Neuroscience laboratory at Birkbeck University of London (UK). Dr Ferre’s research combines experimental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, neuroimaging, vestibular physiology and space science methods to understand how the human brain represents Earth gravity and adapts to non-terrestrial gravitational environments, such as weightlessness or the partial gravity on the Moon or Mars. Her work is supported by national and international project grants, including the UK British Academy, UK Royal Society, BIAL Foundation, European Low Gravity Research Association and European Space Agency (ESA).
7 June 2022

Robust uncertainty quantification of tsunami ionospheric holes for the 2011 Tohoku-Oki earthquake using satellite data.
Date: 7 June 2022
Time: 13:00 - 14:00 BST
This is a zoom meeting. For the link contact s.plattard@ucl.ac.uk
Speaker: Ryuichi Kanai, University College London Department of Statistical Science: Ph.D. student and Visiting Scientist at the Alan Turing Institute
Ryuichi KANAI is a Ph.D. student at UCL statistical science department and a visiting researcher at Alan Turing Institute. His research theme is mainly analyzing data detected by GPS satellites related to tsunamis. By applying statistical techniques, he quantifies uncertainty in estimated data. Ryuichi received a master's degree in MSc data science from UCL and also has a master's degree in applied physics from the University of Tokyo. He has a Bachelor's degree in Applied Physics from the University of Tokyo. Before starting his PhD study, Ryuichi worked in the industry as a data scientist. Earlier, he worked in the Japanese government in its financial authority where he was involved with the legislation of new regulations and laws related to financial transactions and supervising financial institutions.
UCL Space Week 2021/22 Presentations
Find the presentations given at Space Week 2021 here:
Name | Title | Institution | Link |
---|---|---|---|
Monday 8 Nov 2021 - Looking Ahead | |||
Prof Alan Smith | UCL Space Week | UCL | |
Prof Pascale Ehrenfreund | Invited Lecture | IAF / ISU | Not available |
Claire Barcham | National Space Strategy | UK Space Agency | |
Prof Serge Plattard | International Space Policy | UCL | |
Dr Joseph Aschbacher | European Space Agency | ESA | view |
Prof Alan Smith | Space at UCL | UCL | |
Prof David Price | Research and Innovation at UCL | UCL | Not available |
Lucy Edge | Satellite Applications Catapult | SAC | Not available |
Estelle Janin | UCL Space Society | UCL Space Soc | |
Prof Sarah Matthews | Solar-C mission | UCL | Not available |
Prof Mark Cropper | GAIA mission | UCL | |
Prof Tom Kitchin | Euclid mission | UCL | |
Prof Chris Owen | Solar Orbiter mission | UCL | |
Prof Graziella Branduardi-Raymont | SMILE mission | UCL | |
Dr David Jeevendrampillai | Centre for Outer Space Studies | UCL | |
Tuesday 9 November - The Robotic Exploration of the Solar System | |||
Dr Joel Davis | The geology of Mars | Natural History Museum | |
Prof Andrew Coates | ExoMars mission | UCL | |
Prof Geraint Jones | Comet Interceptor mission | UCL | Not available |
Dr Dominic Papineau | The abiotic carbon cycle in [Mars] soils ... | UCL | Not available |
Dr Annie Wellbrock | Heavy Negative Ion Growth in Titan's Polar Winter | UCL | Not available |
Affelia Wibisono | Seeing Jupiter in a New Light | UCL | |
Prof Ian Crawford | The Lunar Surface as a Recorder of Astrophysical Processes | Birkbeck | |
Tuesday 9 November - Humans in Space | |||
Prof Andrew Edkins | UCL's Off World Living Institute | UCL | |
Malica Schmidt | Biology Inspired | UCL | Not available |
Dr Aaron Parkhurst | Off World Analogues | UCL | Not available |
Dr Romain Charles | Mars 500 | MEDES | |
Dr Iya Whiteley | Voice & Wellbeing from Space to Earth | UCL | |
Miles Harris | Analogue Space Research Mission: a UK Pilot | UCL | |
Prof Keith Siew | Can your kidneys make it to Mars and back? | UCL | Not available |
Wednesday 10 November Space Policy Workshop The Future role of academia in the space sector | |||
Prof Sarah Matthews | [Skills and Education] | UCL | Not available |
Dr Steve Welch | [Skills and Education] | KTN | |
Natasha Callens | ESA Academy | ESA | Not available |
Dr Lorrain Hanlon | A Physicist's Perspective on Space Education | University of Dublin | |
Prof Nabil Aouf | [Innovative technologies] | City University | Not available |
Prof Martin Sweeting | Small Satellites - changed the economics of space | Surrey University | |
John Spindler | [Innovative technologies] | Capital Enterprise | Not available |
Kemil Thomas | Role of academia in teh Space sector | UCL | Not available |
Roger Ward | Industry and academia can be a winning combination... | Thales | Not available |
Dr Barbara Ghinelli | Collaboration through Clusters | UKRI | |
Dr Eddie Ross | The future role of academia in the space sector: Collaboration | SAC | |
Dr Chris Castelli | Collaboration in the field of Space Science | UK Space Agency | |
Prof Martin Barstow | Collaboration in Space Research & Innovation | University of Leicester | |
Pallab Ghosh | [Inspiration] | BBC | Not available |
Prof Lucie Green | The future role of academia in the space sector: inspiration | UCL | |
Doug Millard | Engaging to Inspire: Exloring Space with the Science Museum | Science Museum | |
Rachel Venn | Inspiration in the space sector - a student's perspective | UCL | |
Thursday 11 November - Exoplanets | |||
Prof Suzanne Aigrain | A golden age of exoplanet exploration | University of Oxford | |
Dr Vincent van Eylen | Science with PLATO | UCL | vanEylen |
Prof Alan Smith | PLATO Technology | UCL | |
Prof Giovanna Tinetti (given by Prof Giorgio Savini) | Science with Ariel | UCL | Not available |
Prof Giorgio Savini | The ARIEL space mission | UCL | |
Thursday 11 November ESA_Lab | |||
Isabelle Duvaux-Bechon | Make space for Europe | ESA | |
Prof Alan Smith | ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | |
Prof Simon Jackman | ESA_Lab@Oxford | University of Oxford | Not available |
Prof Rick Wylie | ESA_Lab@Lanc | Lancaster University | |
Prof Nigel Bannister | ESA_Lab@Leic | Leicester University | Not available |
Dr Ingo Waldmann | AI@UCL ESA_lab | UCL | |
Prof Kasia Balakier | Satellite communications @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | Not available |
Prof Kwang-Leong Choy | Material Science @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | Not available |
Prof Marek Ziebart | Orbital Dynamics @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | Not available |
Ian Raper | PM & SE @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | |
Prof Lucie Green | Space Weather @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | |
Dr Michel Tsamados | EO @ ESA_Lab@UCL | UCL | |
Thursday 11 November Conference Debat | |||
Prof Cathy Clerbaux | Temperature and climate gases, what can we see from space? | CNRS, ULB | |
Dr Michel Tsamados | Climate Change from Space | UCL | |
Prof Dan Osborn | Adapting to Climate Change: A key role for satellite observations | UCL |
Call for Speakers

Our One O’clock lunchtime Webinar series is intended to be an informal platform for sharing on Space related topics to a general, non-specialist audience including UCL undergraduate and postgraduate students, staff members, and is open to the general public. All lectures now take place via Microsoft Teams virtually between 13:00-14:00. Time permitting, we open up the chat for questions at the end of the lecture.
We are looking for either 20 minutes (in which we would have two speakers to fill the slot with 10 minutes for Q&A each) or 40 minutes presentations with 20 minutes for Q&A, time permitting. We welcome contributions related to Space Research/Projects/Competitions/Interests taking place at UCL. Although definitely not exclusive, we are particularly interested in topics which fit within the following Themes:
- Earth/Climate Change
- Humans in Space
- Space as a Natural Asset
- Science in, about and from Space
- “Living with a Star”
- ‘The Exploration conversation: Robots or humans or both?’
- Local Space
- ‘Propulsion; from rockets and motors to the future’
- National and International Space Policy
- What is New Space: Privatization, commercial exploitation of space, or democratization?
- How to get involved in space – career paths and journeys
- Space and culture – a historical relationship
- Xenobiology/Astrobiology – Learning from extreme environments on Earth
This is a fantastic opportunity for Early Career Researchers and Postgraduate Students at UCL to engage, communicate and reach out to a wider audience with their research. As well as providing excellent exposure for their research and showcasing future leaders in the Space Sector this series offers a supportive, collegiate environment for sharing ideas/research and the potential of constructive comments/feedback/insights from a wide audience including senior academics at UCL, leaders in the Space Sector, student peers, industry professionals and the wider interested general public.
Speakers can be very diverse, including senior academics describing their research, post docs describing recent result and students outlining an area of current interest. We particularly encourage the participation of Early Career Researchers, postgraduate students and other researchers particularly those who identify as underrepresented groups including Women, BAME, LGBT + community and disabled individuals at UCL. In this spirit, we would like to reach out to our senior UCL colleagues and staff and ask them to actively encourage their Early Career Researchers and Postgraduate Students who may not normally feel confident presenting or sharing their work to come forward and apply.
To be considered to speak please fill out the form or email an abstract (of approximately 250-300 words) or alternatively a graphical/video/audio abstract to the organising committee. Please note that we encourage all postgraduate students to discuss this opportunity with their supervisor/s before submitting an abstract.
Past One O’clock Space lectures can be found here.
Additional Requirements
If you anticipate having any additional requirements when presenting, please make us aware of these when you register. These may include accessibility, access, caring responsibilities or other additional requirements that will enable you to present.
Accessibility
It is expected that presentations and handouts adhere to Advance HE’s accessibility requirements and we will provide presenters with the relevant guidance material.
If you use Microsoft Teams at your institution, please sign in to your Microsoft Teams App with the
credentials issued by your host institution.
You do NOT need to possess an Office 365 or ‘Teams Licence’ to attend this event. Click the meeting link
to join the meeting at the time of the event.
Please note that the session may be recorded and retained as per UCL’s retention schedule. The Chat
function within the meeting will be retained as per UCL’s retention schedule.
Please note we are unable to offer technical support to participants external to UCL.
Blogs and Video Blogs Wanted!
The Space Domain is looking for blog or video blog posts to host on our website. We are particularly interested in the following themes but welcome all topics on Space.
- Off-World Living
- ESA
- Satellite Applications
- AI and Space
We want to particularly encourage ECRs. Postgraduate students are also welcome to submit posts with the permission of their supervisors. Please email submissions.
Space Images Wanted!
The UCL Space Domain is looking for your best Space images to create a mosaic image of London taken from the ISS and put on our new Space Domain T-Shirts and Tote Bags. If you have a great image that encapsulates the Space Domain or the research that is going on at UCL please add it to our mosaic here.
Please note that the images will not be attributable as part of the mosaic but will be fully attributed if used in any other way.