UCL-Birkbeck Planetary Science

Thinking of our wonderful colleague Professor Graziella Branduardi-Raymont based at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory @uclmaps.bsky.social. Graziella was the SMILE Co-Principal Investigator before her passing last November. No doubt she would have been thrilled with this news 💙🚀☀️

A group of 16 people wearing white cleanroom suits pose for a photo inside a bright laboratory. They are standing and kneeling in front of a large spacecraft covered in shiny silver and gold thermal material, mounted on a vertical support structure. Some team members wear masks, and the background shows technical equipment and cleanroom walls.

🆕 #Smile passes qualification & flight acceptance review, meeting all requirements for launch.
🚀 The joint European-Chinese mission will launch on a Vega-C rocket from Europe's spaceport in French Guiana.
📆 Launch window is set for 8 April to 7 May 2026.
Find out more👉 www.esa.int/Science_Expl...
🧪☀️

We have a PhD opportunity at the University of Reading focused on analysing Jupiter and Saturn auroral observations!

Title: Investigating Earth-like responses to the Solar Wind in Gas Giant Upper Atmospheres

Supervisor: me!

Full description/application portal:
www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

NASA to Share Comet 3I/ATLAS Images From Spacecraft, Telescopes - NASA NASA will host a live event at 3 p.m. EST, Wednesday, Nov. 19, to share imagery of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS collected by a number of the agency’s

NASA will host a live event at 3 p.m. EST, Wednesday, Nov. 19, to share imagery of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS collected by a number of the agency’s missions. The event will take place at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. www.nasa.gov/news-release... ☄️🔭

🤩 CPS member Dr Paola Pinilla is based at the UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory in Surrey @uclmaps.bsky.social where she leads a research group of postdocs and students on the topic of planet formation ☀️🌀🪐

Data scientist Dr Robert Shore gives a talk to the audience at the Royal Astronomical Society's Early Career Event.

Geologist Professor Chris Jackson gives a talk remotely.

Dr Paola Pinilla shares experiences from her own career during the Royal Astronomical Society's Early Career Event.

It's been an informative and inspiring morning here at our Early Career Event.

RAS Award winner Dr Paola Pinilla, data scientist Dr Robert Shore and geologist Professor Chris Jackson have been among the speakers offering advice and sharing experiences they've encountered during their careers. 🪐🖥️🌋

🛰️ New Europlanet webinar with @esa.int's Juice mission! This webinar will outline the current status of radar sounding for Earth observation and its connection to RIME’s science for the exploration of the Jupiter icy moons 👉 Register: us02web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

🚀 New Europlanet Webinar! We'll talk about the sulphur cycle in the atmosphere of Venus, with fresh results and what insights they might bring >> Register 👉 us02web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

🚨Event alert🚨

Have you registered your attendance for 'The Impact of UK Planetary Geoscience' conference at the Geological Society of London?

📅 27 Nov
🎟️ Reduced rates for @royalastrosoc.bsky.social Fellows
📝 Registration closes 26 Nov
ℹ️ geolsoc.org.uk/events/the-impact-of-uk-planetary-geoscience

RAS logo on a starry background.

📣 Announcement📣

We are aware that as a result of the Cloudflare outage some people are having problems accessing the ScholarOne submission system.

If you are trying to submit a paper to one of our journals #MNRAS, #GJI or #RASTI and need to speak to the editorial office, email publishing@ras.ac.uk

Statement from Scientists at the Planetary Science Pavilion, about the current state of COP negotiations - Planetary Science Pavilion Belém, November 14, 2025. Most of the CO2 budget that would push warming to 1.5°C has already been emitted, mainly by the world’s major economies. Now, midway through the decade, when global emissions...

When you look at it like this, every moment of hot air is especially inexcusable. Please share from my science colleagues at #COP30

planetarysciencepavilion.org/2025/11/14/s...

This is an artist's impression of ESA’s mission Ariel, shown here to study the atmosphere of an exoplanet orbiting another star. Four other exoplanets are visible in the image.

A #CosmicVision mission, #ESAAriel is one of three ESA missions dedicated to studying exoplanets.

Its goal? Inspect the atmospheres of a thousand such planets, ranging from rocky planets to gas giants.

1/ #CM25 🔭

Islamophobia Awareness Month: November 2025 November is Islamophobia Awareness Month. This year’s theme invites us all to challenge stereotypes and prejudices – find out how to get involved, including a lunch and learn session, links to network...

#IslamophobiaAwarenessMonth is here!

Flipping the Script is all about challenging stereotypes and supporting Muslim staff and students.

Learn how to be an active bystander, access networks, and create a safer, more inclusive @ucl.ac.uk: tinyurl.com/ucl-iam25

#UCLGeography #FlippingTheScript

Illustration showing spacecraft A, probe B1 built by JAXA and probe B2, and the suite of instruments they each carry, alongside other important components. The instruments and parts are colour coded according to four categories: blue for Dust, Fields and Plasma (DFP) instrument suite, orange for Plasma instrument suite, red for other scientific instruments, and green for important components.

#CometInterceptor will be the first mission to visit a comet coming directly from the outer reaches of the Sun's realm, carrying material untouched since the dawn of the Solar System.

Part of #CosmicVision, Comet Interceptor is an ESA-led mission in collaboration with JAXA.

1/ #CM25 🔭

Only a few days left! 📅⌛

Time is running out to submit applications for the Norman Lockyer Fellowship, offered to outstanding candidates to enable them to pursue research in the UK in the disciplines advanced by the RAS.

⤵️

IAS Book Launch: Galaxies Join us at the IAS for a double book launch dedicated to galaxies. We welcome authors Richard Ellis (When Galaxies were Born) and Or Graur (Galaxies).

IAS Book Launch: Galaxies 🌌✨🚀
26 November 2025, 6pm-8pm
Join us at the IAS for a double book launch dedicated to galaxies. We welcome authors Richard Ellis (When Galaxies were Born) and Or Graur (Galaxies).
www.ucl.ac.uk/institute-of...

Determining the impact of post-main-sequence stellar evolution on the transiting giant planet population ABSTRACT. The post-main-sequence evolution of stars is expected to impact the exoplanets residing on close-in orbits around them. Using photometric data fr

The paper is open access for all to read and can be found here - doi.org/10.1093/mnra...

The ageing of host stars can be catastrophic for planets!

Our new research into this planet population shows that the evolution of stars causes giant planets to spiral into their host stars and be destroyed.

Check out the press release below and paper (published in MNRAS today!) for more

Space swimsuits at the ready! 🧑‍🚀🩱

The latest episode of The Supermassive Podcast explores Mars' wet past and includes a guest appearance from RAS Librarian Sian Prosser.

When did the red planet have water? Where did it go? And were there canals on Mars? 🔴🌊

🎧 Listen at: podfollow.com/supermassive/

Graphic promoting the Caroline Herschel Medal 2026.

This year's Caroline Herschel Medal will celebrate an outstanding woman astronomer based in Germany.🏅🔭👩🔬

All women may apply and together with the @germanastrosoc.bsky.social we welcome self-nominations.

Find out more at: ras.ac.uk/awards-and-g...

A study led by CPS colleagues Dr Ed Bryant (now @uni-of-warwick.bsky.social) and Associate Professor in Exoplanets, Dr Vincent Van Eylen at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory @uclmaps.bsky.social ☀️🪐

🚨New research alert🚨

Ever wondered what might happen to Earth and the other planets in our solar system when the Sun becomes a red giant in 5 billion years? ☀️🔴

A key focus of #ESAJuice will be Ganymede: Jupiter’s largest moon, thought to have a salty ocean beneath its icy shell.

Juice will study:
☁️ Ganymede's atmosphere and ionosphere
🧀 Its surface
🌊 The subsurface ocean

3/ 🔭 #CM25

🗞️ Join us online on 12 November for Europlanet Teams Day! A unique opportunity to help you find new collaborators, discover funding and training opportunities and connect with the wider Europlanet community.

Register now 👉 bit.ly/europlanet_teamsday

Super opportunity for Early Career Researchers! 👇

Graphics card showing students at ESA for the opening of the 2025 ESA Student Internships programme

🚀 Ready to launch your career into space? ESA Student Internships 2026 are now open!

www.esa.int/About_Us/Car... #ESArecruits

Professor Olsson-Francis delivers acceptance speech

We’re very proud to announce that our Director, Prof Karen Olsson-Francis, has been elected President of the European Astrobiology Network Association (EANA). She is the first British President of this prestigious network.

Congratulations Karen! 🎉

📣 Come and work with us!

FOUR PhD vacancies are now open in AstrobiologyOU for Oct 2026 start.

Funding is via the Central England NERC Training Alliance @centa.bsky.social

For details and how to apply see the project descriptions.
centa.ac.uk/projects/?_s...

📣 Shout all about it! 📣

We've got a new award that may be of interest to student scientists.

One of our journals, RAS Techniques and Instruments (RASTI), has launched an annual student prize for the 'best' paper published in the journal by a student scientist. 🧑🔬 🔭

⤵️

What Searching For Aliens Reveals About Ourselves | NOEMA Looking for life beyond Earth changes the way we perceive life right here at home.

“Conflating intelligence & technology is an assumption worth challenging. True intelligence may know not to use the technologies we so dearly cling to as we plumb our planet’s riches to exhaustion.”

— @miquai.bsky.social