Word from the President
Dear Members,
Tomorrow, 1st February, we start a new phase of the Europlanet Project! The Europlanet 2024 Research Infrastructure (RI) is a four-year project funded by the European Commission under Horizon 2020. It seeks to address key scientific and technological challenges facing modern planetary science. As with the immensely successful previous RI, it will provide open access to state-of-the-art research data, tools and 29 facilities and field sites across Europe and beyond. The project is a collaboration between 53 beneficiaries and is supported by a further 44 affiliated partners.
Europlanet 2024 RI is tightly integrated with the Europlanet Society and will depend on our Society's Hubs, Committees and wider membership to deliver its ambitious programme of activities.
Stay tuned for more details of what the RI offers to Society members and the wider planetary community at the official launch the Europlanet 2024 RI project later this month.
Nigel Mason
President, Europlanet Society
Coordinator, Europlanet 2024 RI
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Meet the Europlanet Society's Executive Board
Anita Heward is the Secretary of the Europlanet Society. She has been involved in Europlanet since 2006, when she took part in its very first outreach workshop and she set up the press office for the inaugural EPSC in Berlin. Anita has played an active role in shaping the media, outreach and policy programmes in Europlanet EC-funded projects. As part of the management team for the new Europlanet 2024 RI project, she will ensure that that there is close collaboration between the Society and the RI for the benefit of the whole planetary community. As Secretary of the Europlanet Society, she aims to support the membership in proactive engagement with other communities, including policy makers, industry, the general public and the next generation of European citizens and planetary scientists.
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Open Calls for Applications
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Scientific data exploitation
The EC H2020 programme has announced the next call for supporting the data exploitation of European missions and instruments, in conjunction, when relevant, with international missions. Europlanet supported the announcement of this call so we are keen to see a good response. Please let us know if you plan a bid!
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AbGradEPEC 2020
La Palma Island, Spain, 16-19 April 2020
AbGradEPEC 2020 is a joint symposium/workshop organized by the Astrobiology Graduates in Europe (AbGradE) and the Europlanet Early Career (EPEC) Network. The event will take place before the first BEACON conference from the European Astrobiology Institute (EAI).
If you are interested, register before 1 February 2020!
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43th COSPAR Scientific Assembly
Sydney, Australia, 15 – 22 August 2020
The call for abstracts for the COSPAR Scientific Assembly is now open! We encourage you to submit an abstract before 14 February 2020, notably to the "Scientific Commission B" Sessions on Planetary Science.
There will also be a COSPAR Panel on Planetary Protection Business meeting to which you are welcome.
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17th AOGS Annual Meeting
Hongcheon, South Korea, 28 June – 4 July 2020
The abstract submission deadline for the 17th AOGS Annual Meeting was extended to 4 February 2020. You may want to consider submitting an abstract for the Session PS11 "Geology, Geophysics, and Habitability in Our Solar System".
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EAS Annual Meeting 2020
Leiden, The Netherlands, 29 June – 3 July 2020
Abstract submission is now open for the European Astronomical Society's Annual Meeting (formerly known as EWASS). You may want to consider submitting an abstract before 2 March 2020 for the Sessions
S1 "Planet formation enters the observational era", S12 "Exoplanets in the 2020s: theory, observations, and instrumentation" and LS5 "Community update on CHEOPS".
The Europlanet Society is also co-convening the session SS1 "Making the case for European astronomy and space science: public and political engagemeny".
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Europlanet Community Corner
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Motivational Journeys – the video series from EPEC
“Try as many things as you can through your career and find your passion through it.” This is the advice passed on by Dr. Linda Spilker of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to early career researchers
📽️ Join the journey and let the interview motivate you!
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Second Afar Desert Class
The second 'Afar Desert Class' will take place on 10th February 2020 at Hamed’Ela, Afar, Ethiopia. The class aims to engage children and the community from the village nearest to the Dallol planetary analogue field site. Through a playtime program, they will discover what the amazing environments of the Afar Desert and the Dallol volcano have to offer. To find out more, read this interview with Barbara Cavalazzi following the first 'Afar Desert Class' in February 2019.
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Inspiring Stories – Motivational Journeys
Our interview series ‘Motivational Journeys’ was inspired by one early career researcher's desire to find out about the professional struggles and highlights behind some well known faces in the planetary science community.
Learn more in this EPEC inspiring story by Rutu Parekh, PhD student at the DLR Institute of Planetary Science and Chair of the EPEC Diversity Working Group.
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Ireland & UK Hub Regional Meeting
Royal Astronomical Society, London, 7 March 2020
The Ireland and UK Hub invite researchers from the planetary science community to take part in their first regional meeting. We particularly encourage presentations from early career researchers, and scientists who have disseminated their work via Europlanet networking workshops and / or research infrastructure. The programme will consist of oral and poster presentations.
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Planetary Science Highlights
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ExoMars Rover completes environmental tests
The Rosalind Franklin rover of the joint ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars mission completed a series of environmental tests at the end of 2019 at Airbus, Toulouse, France. This included final thermal and vacuum tests where the Rover is heated and cooled to simulate the temperatures of its journey through space and on the surface of Mars. Read more >>
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Junior Science Officer position
Space Sciences & Communication
European Science Foundation, France
The European Science Foundation, the host organisation of the Europlanet Society, is looking for a Junior Science Officer with a background in space sciences and communition. The position is specifically oriented to support ESF space cluster’s communication tasks and projects, notably dealing with the Europlanet Society.
Deadline for application: 14 February 2020
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Post-doctoral position
Early Life labororatory, University of Liège, Belgium
In the frame of the FNRS project "Life in Archean coastal environments" and the ICDP project BASE "Barberton Archean Surface Environments, the Early Life traces and Evolution-Astrobiology labororatory is looking for a postoctoral researcher. The project aims to characterize the past morphological and geochemical traces of early life preserved in fresh pristine cores drilled in the 3.2 Ga Moodies Group, Barberton Greenstone Belt, South Africa, the oldest best preserved siliciclastic succession preserving coastal sediments, from marine to terrestrial environments. Appointment is for 1 year, renewable up to 2 times (3 years in total).
Deadline for application: 15 March 2020
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PhD position – ACDC with deep learning
Université Paris Saclay, France
The Université Paris Saclay is opening a PhD position on "Automatic Crater Detection and Characterization with deep learning" to students with an engineer or master grade in machine learning/data mining or in planetary science. The PhD contract will be 3 years, starting from October 2020, with the possibility to conduct an internship of 6 months maximum, in spring/summer 2020.
Deadline for application: 1 March 2020
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12th European Space Conference
The 12th European Space Conference took place in Brussels on 21-22 January and was attended by representatives of the European Commission, the European Parliament, national governments, space agencies, the scientific world and industries. Topics covered included space for prosperity and sustainability, science and innovation, digitisation and connectivity, space for society and economy. Ann Carine Vandaele, Vice-President of the Europlanet Society, attended the conference. Read her report >>
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