Optical Calibration Engineer for Gaia (SOE-37)
Aurora is an established and approved supplier of skilled manpower to ESA and in particular at ESTEC and ESAC. There is a great opportunity to join the Aurora team supporting ESA at ESAC, near Madrid, for the following work. In particular Aurora currently has 3 engineers supporting the GAIA team at ESAC.Overview and Tasks
The GAIA mission is planning to map to microarcsecond accuracy 1% of the stellar population of our galaxy - that is around one thousand million objects. Each object will be seen about 100 times over the five year mission. The data reduction of the ~100 Terabytes of downlinked data is estimated to require a Petabyte storage system.
The processing will be community wide effort performed by the Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC) in which ESAC play a coordination role.
The ESAC team is heavily involved in DPAC especially in the overall architecture and the core processing. The core processing includes initial data treatment and the Astrometric Global Iterative Solution (AGIS) to solve for the many unknown astrometric parameters. The processing is distributed over five locations and ESAC will form the hub for data exchange via the Main Database. This main database will form the input for all processing and will be augmented with the output of all processing to arrive at a new version.
The production of processing software for Gaia has started and will continue through operations to final catalogue production in 2019.
Specific tasks include:
To provide technical assistance to the ESAC calibration engineer on Gaia calibration particularly in the area of optics. Calibration activities of the Gaia system have at least three facets:
1. On ground calibration: The prime contractor EADS-Astrium must perform an initial calibration of Gaia pre flight. The resulting data will have to be included in the processing chain. Examples are geometrical calibrations of the CCD, characterization of abberations, straylight analysis, alignment, etc. A good understanding of this data and the underlying models must be gained and propagated to the community. Several DPAC members will also require access to this data.
2. In-flight commissioning and calibration: Gaia will be commissioned during its cruise phase to and first months in orbit around L2. This will consist of measurements to verify the validity of the on-ground calibrations and characterize the in-orbit performance of the payload. After commissioning, it is still not entirely defined, which manner of calibrations have to be performed and how they may be applied to the satellite. There will certainly be on-board calibration tables, which will need updating during the entire duration of the mission.
3. Radiation damage: with a launch date late in 2011 during a solar maximum, Gaia will initially receive a large dose of radiation. The effects of radiation on CCDs and optics are being studied at the moment. A central question is how the radiation-induced degradation of the astrometric, photometric and spectrometric performances can be compensated/minimized in the data processing.
The calibration engineer will be expected to gain a deep understanding of Gaia's payload, especially its optical design. How it may be calibrated, and how pre- and in-flight calibration data can be incorporated into the processing chain. Ultimately, the role would include definition of the Science Operations Requirements to which science operations software will be built. In this respect, the candidate will have to develop a good understanding, in the engineering sense, of how to operate and control this unique payload.
Specific qualification requirements
Higher university degree in Physics or Engineering with specialisation in Optics.
Specific knowledge is required in the following areas:
- Optical engineering
- Numerical Methods
- Spacecraft Engineering
- Spacecraft Operations
- Processing laboratory data
- Optical design tools (Code V, OpTaliX)
- Space borne optical instrumentation
- Java programming
- Mathematical modelling
- ECSS standards.
For any candidate experience in interacting with the science community would be an advantage. The selected contractors must be willing operate in a team environment and to travel. Good interpersonal and communication skills are an advantage. The contractors should be comfortable in an international working environment and be fluent in English, one of the official languages of ESA.
Location
The work will be performed at the ESAC, the European Space Astronomy Centre, at Villafranca del Castillo, near Madrid, Spain.
It will also require several short missions.
Contract
The work is currently planned for a duration of 6 years from a starting date of June / July 2009. Aurora is offering a permanent contract.- You will be registered for both social security and tax in Spain.
- The standard working hours are 40 per week. There are 12 public holidays and an additional 27 annual days holiday.
- Training to improve efficiency and provide strength for future career are of course included.
- Aurora can assist financially and provide information for relocation.
Summary
Aurora's successful formula is ensuring the happiness of employees and customers.
To be considered for this Position
Provide prior to 26 January 2009 a complete and detailed Recruitment Form to Mr. Alex Jeanes, user alexjeanes @ aurora.nl quoting reference SOE-37.
Aurora will agree conditional employment terms and conditions with candidates before presenting their recruitment form to ESA on 2 February 2009. ESA will select the candidates for interview at ESAC and Aurora will provide for interview travel costs. Should ESA select you then a formal letter of employment shall be issued with an agreed start date.