Common Contracts

ABSTRACT

September 9th, 2021

• Filed
  September 9th, 2021

The consortium ESPaCE (European Satellite Partnership for Computing Ephemerides) is composed of seven European institutes: IMCCE (Institut de Mécanique Céleste et de Calcul des Ephémérides, Paris Obs.), ROB (Royal Observatory of Belgium), TUB (Technical University of Berlin), ERIC (European Research Infrastructure Consortium formerly known as JIVE : Joint Institute for VLBI in Europe), TUD (Delft University of Technology), French space agency (CNES) in France and German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Germany. The objective of the consortium, initiated under an FP7-European project is to provide new accurate ephemerides of natural satellites and spacecraft. For this goal astrometric data issued from ground-based observations as well as from space observations are being analyzed and reduced. On the other hand emerging technologies, specifically VLBI and interplanetary laser ranging, applied to the positioning of spacecraft are also studied. The ESPaCE project addresses also data related to gr