Space Park Leicester to bring space back down to Earth at national conference

Whether you have aspirations to venture out into the cosmos, or to bring it back to Earth, Space Park Leicester will be demonstrating how Leicester expertise is enabling different approaches to space exploration at a national conference this month.

Staff from Space Park Leicester, the University of Leicester’s £100 million science and innovation park, will be attending UK Space Conference 2025 in Manchester from 16-17 July to showcase some of their cutting-edge work that is harnessing the opportunities of space. Visitors can find them at stand C7.

As part of the exhibition, a team of Leicester research engineers will present an early prototype Double Walled Isolator, a miniature laboratory designed to store and handle returned extra-terrestrial samples, such as the first material from Mars.

To avoid cross-contamination when studying the samples, a future DWI may use state of the art robotics to move the samples around an inert gas environment. An optical microscope and a Raman spectrometer will provide information about the chemistry and geology of the rock material.

The team has now successfully completed a System Readiness Review and has recently been given the go-ahead by the European Space Agency to design the Qualification Model of the Double-Walled Isolator.

UK and international experts and innovators from academia, government, and industry will join this year’s UK Space Conference as it charts the future of the UK space sector. The theme is growth. Growth of awareness, investment, our workforce, our capabilities, and our economy.  

This year, UK Space Conference sessions are explicitly focused on solutions – next steps that lead to meaningful outcomes. It aims to leverage expertise and insight from the space sector and beyond to stimulate debate and collaboration on the key issues in space and society.  

Space Park Leicester will also be contributing to the conference by showcasing their CPD offering, designed for professionals from all backgrounds seeking to gain essential skills and knowledge about working in or with the space industry.

To demonstrate the impact that the space industry has on our everyday lives, Space Park Leicester will also be unveiling a short video on how Earth Observation is helping us to learn about and protect our world, from the impacts of climate change to supporting agriculture and food security. It will provide an overview of the services, research, skills and capabilities available at Space Park Leicester and the University of Leicester, as well as the Leicester-based National Centre for Earth Observation.

Attendees will also be treated to the distinctive vision of space exploration from the brushes of renowned Leicester artist Matt Turner, who will be exhibiting some of his works at the conference this year. Among them will be two artworks capturing space missions that the University of Leicester has played vital roles in: BepiColombo, which Leicester scientists built and designed the MIXS instrument for, and the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer (SMILE) which incorporates the Leicester-led Soft X-ray Imager (SXI).

While at the conference, visitors should look out for copies of Engineering Magazine, which will feature Space Park Leicester’s collaboration with NASA Glenn to develop an Americium powered Radioisotope Stirling Generator (Am-RSG).

Will Wells, Chief Executive Officer of Space Park Leicester, said: “Every year, the UK Space Conference offers an exclusive platform for interacting with leaders in the industry and exchanging insights and plans for the ever-evolving landscape of the space sector. At Space Park Leicester, we have seen some exciting developments across our portfolio and we are delighted to be able to share more on those with visitors to this year’s event.

“Together with the vibrant community of innovative organisations in Leicester’s Space City cluster, we are forging new paths in space research, production, manufacture and development. Whether it is the expertise that delivers innovations like the Double Walled Isolator, or the education opportunities on offer, we’ll be showcasing the University of Leicester’s cutting-edge capabilities at Space Park Leicester.”

Space Park Leicester is one of the assets that forms Space City Leicester, an urban innovation district which supports education, innovation and business growth. Home to the National Space Centre and 100+ businesses, it is driving high value products and growth.”

Discover more about Space Park Leicester’s cutting-edge partnerships, pioneering missions, resident community, state-of-the-art facilities, specialist training programmes and innovation ecosystem at www.space-park.co.uk. Explore how your organisation can collaborate with us here. To learn more about the University of Leicester, visit le.ac.uk.

Main image: A US delegation visiting the Breadboard model of the Double Waller Isolator at Space Park Leicester last month