Program Overview

Program Overview

The program focuses on assessing the collision risk of spacecraft mega-constellations. Constellations of thousands of spacecraft are currently being launched, which will provide new or better services on the ground but also increase the risk of orbital collisions.

Program Description

The available tools to estimate this risk currently rely on strong assumptions to make the calculations tractable from a computational standpoint. This project aims to start implementing a new tool for assessing the collision risk that models the physics of the problem more accurately.

Program Outcomes

The expected outcomes of this program include:

• Understanding of orbital dynamics
• Understanding of orbital conjunction
• A software prototype to accurately assess the collision risk associated with mega-constellations

Specializations

The program is related to the following specializations:

• Mechanical Engineering
• Mechatronics Engineering

Prerequisites

The prerequisites for this program are:

• Good analytical/mathematical skills
• Good programming skills
  • Experience in high-performance computing is preferable
  • Basic knowledge of orbital dynamics is preferable