The Thomas Rigby’s in Liverpool was the venue for this Liverpool Northern Stars meeting. The location was chosen as it was around the corner from where, in 1933, the British Interplanetary Society first met. This was one of the NSC evening informal events where individuals meet to learn about local developments and network.
Following an introduction by Bob Morris, Luke Vanstone gave an overview of STFC’s operations and the new regional Business Incubation Ambassador Alan Cross described his role. Mobin Malik, Gunter Just and Luciana Sinpetru described their projects and some of ongoing space work at the University of Manchester from small satellites to propulsion systems. Doug Arnold and Jon Marchant from Liverpool John Moores talked about the work at the Astrophysics Research Institute on astronomy and telescopes including the uptodate status of the proposed Liverpool Telescope 2. The University of Liverpool had just won a major contract to conduct a study on the International Space Station into the effects of aging and James Henstock and Kai Hoettges gave an overview of the project.
Bob Morris summarised some of the activity in Wales including the Satnogs ground station work at Bangor University. Chris Berg, A2O Innovation Systems, described his ground breaking work in materials failures. Joanne Phoenix updated everyone on the facilities and help on offer at nearby Sensor City and just how successful it had been in its first year. The last talk was given by Mark Waters, 4wardFutures, describing his work around education and empowering people to help them progress their careers.
This was followed by informal discussions and networking. A very interesting and successful evening.