Speakers
Tibor Herman
BME
Tibor is a PhD student at TU Budapest (BME), where he is researching the field of PocketQubes and their scientific subsystems. Over his studies, he worked on the university's first 2 single unit PQ satellites, SMOG-P and SMOG-1, responsible for the electrical power system. Since then the MRC-100 was launched, which is a 3P spacecraft with several new scientific experiments and serves as a basis for his research. Tibor used to work for Silicon Labs and Bosch in Budapest before returning to BME.
Ariadna Anguita
UPC Space Program
Ariadna is an Aerospace RAMS Engineer who is finishing her MSc in Aerospace Engineering. She is involved in several space initiatives such as Women In Aerospace - Europe in Barcelona (WIA-E), was a member of ESA’s 4th SSEA organizing team in April 2022, and is currently coordinating the UPC Space Program student association.
UPC Space Program is a Spanish student organization based in Terrassa, Barcelona. It specializes in space projects such as developing a Martian Rover, High Altitude Balloons, Rocketry, UAVs, and most recently Nano and Picosatellites technologies focusing on affordability and cost-effectiveness. Their greatest accomplishment has been achieving the 9th position in the European Rover Challenge (ERC) in Poland in 2022, and it is the only Spanish representative team in ERC’s 2023 edition for the third consecutive year.
Alasdair Allan
Raspberry Pi
Alasdair Allan is a scientist, author, maker, and journalist. He currently works for Raspberry Pi, and is in charge of writing things down. He is somewhat notorious for causing one of the first big mobile privacy scandals, which eventually became known as “locationgate.” A former astronomer, he also built a peer-to-peer network of autonomous, reactive telescopes; and contributed to the detection of what — at the time — was the most distant object yet discovered in the Universe.
Joe Latrell
QUUB
Joe Latrell is an inventor and technology developer who has coordinated payloads for launch on the SpaceX Falcon 9, Blue Origin New Shepard, and Rocket Lab Electron.
Prior to quub, Joe gained wide-ranging experience in a variety of technology roles, such as launching an early-stage suborbital rocket company, coding programs for large datasets, and developing numerous software packages for the education industry.
Joe founded quub to manufacture small, cost-effective satellites designed to gather data and monitor Earth, its weather systems, and its environmental resources. His goal is to create a network of satellites that give first responders, companies, and municipalities the data they need to respond and act quickly.
Alessandro Fanni
C-Shark S.r.l
Alessandro Fanni holds the position of Founder & Managing Director and Research and Development Director of Cshark S.r.l., an innovative start-up company from Piacenza. He is the founder of Cshark Solutions and Cshark S.r.l.
In 2019 the software created by Cshark S.r.l., was awarded by Milano Finanza as one of the 100 innovative products for the digitisation of companies and was also mentioned in an article by Forbes France. In 2022, Cshark S.r.l launched their first nano-satellite ‘Pilot-1’ via SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.
Alessandro collaborates with various partners and research centres such as the National Institute of Nuclear Physics, ESA, ASI, and the Universities of Bologna and Pavia.
Pietro Steiner
SmartIR
Dr. Pietro Steiner is the Research and Product Development Manager at SmartIR, where he contributes to the development of innovative thermal management solutions for spacecraft. His academic and professional journey has been characterized by a commitment to research, technology, and entrepreneurship.
Dr. Steiner earned his Ph.D. in nanoscience from the University of Manchester, specializing in the study of nanomaterials. His research was conducted as part of the Graphene NOWNANO CDT program, known for its work in the field of nanomaterials. During his doctoral studies, he had the opportunity to collaborate with Airbus, who sponsored his research. His project focused on the creation and analysis of materials designed for heat transfer active devices in space applications, demonstrating his expertise in materials science.
Dr. Steiner has a strong interest in knowledge dissemination and innovation. He has authored several research papers on graphene-based materials and holds a patent for a novel technology. His academic journey led to an opportunity at SmartIR, where he initially joined as an R&D Engineer during the final year of his Ph.D. Over time, he has advanced to his current role as Research and Product Development Manager, contributing to the company's research and product improvement efforts.
Outside of his work at SmartIR, Dr. Steiner co-founded two start-up ventures. One of them, Graphene Trace, specializes in developing pressure sensors for biomedical applications using smart textiles. The other venture, The Graphene Hackathon, aims to promote innovation by rethinking traditional product development processes and fostering a culture of learning, experimentation, and entrepreneurial thinking.
Adam Kiss
University of Szeged
Adam is a Ph.D. student at the University of Szeged, researching neuroscience-related signal processing and electrophysiology. He fell in love with radio in his teenage years and got familiar with satellites during his BSc and MSc studies at TU Budapest (BME). Over his current research, he is actively developing a 70 cm satellite receiver station with the support of his university. Since the launch of the MRC-100 satellite, this station has submitted over 47,000 packets to its operators.
Paul Stansell
Solid State Propulsion
Paul is an individual deeply invested in the realm of space propulsion. From his early days, he demonstrated an inclination towards understanding the intricacies of space propulsion, as evidenced by his school projects involving custom solid rocket motors and an EMdrive prototype. Academically, Paul's journey through the world of astrophysics and physics is noteworthy. With an undergraduate degree in Astronomy and Astrophysics, followed by honours in Theoretical Physics and a Master's by Research in Physics, he has consistently pursued his passion. For his master's project, he developed a vacuum arc ion thruster that utilizes metal as its propellant source. Today, Paul is working on Solid State Propulsion, or SSP. He's currently focused on adapting a vacuum arc thruster for PocketQubes, an endeavor that aims to make advancements in this technology and prove its utility. His goal, informed by past experiments like the first ever use of a metallic meteorite as fuel for a gridded ion thruster, is to explore the practicalities of in-space refuelling, particularly from metallic asteroids.
Elliott Hastings
Rhea Space Activity
Elliott Hastings is a quantum physicist at Rhea Space Activity. His current role is focused on developing innovative secure communications solutions and capabilities for government customers. As part of the RSA team, he has also had exposure to the challenges of navigation and communication in novel, challenging environments. In the past, Elliott has worked on several UK-based CubeSat missions for quantum communications.
Kean-How Cheah
University of Nottingham
Dr. Kean How CHEAH is an Assistant Professor at School of Aerospace, University of Nottingham Ningbo China. He received the BEng degree in aerospace from Universiti Sains Malaysia, and the PhD degree in engineering from the University of Nottingham. Prior to joining the university, he held academic positions with Heriot-Watt University Malaysia and Taylor’s University and post-doctoral researcher position with Satellite Research Centre, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
More To Be Announced…
Keynote Speaker
Mehmet Sevket Uludag
TUDelft
M. Sevket Uludag currently works as Researcher for the Delft University of Technology, in The Netherlands, working on projects on small satellites and in charge of facilities for the space department. His research is focused on highly miniaturized systems, multi-agent space systems and digital twins. He started working on small satellites since his sophomore: working on small satellites for 13 years, involved in 6 CubeSats projects where 4 of them are in orbit and has developed and tested various subsystems and payloads. He has over 1000 hours of hands-on experience in thermal cycling test of CubeSats and various payloads, and 200 hours for vibration testing.