Asteroid Identification Software Intern

EU Satellite Centre (SatCen); Frascati; On-site; EUR 12,000 - 18,000; Full time

Job summary

European Space Agency invites university students to participate in an internship focused on developing software to automatically identify asteroids in observational databases. You will build a scalable pipeline, compare predictions with data, and validate results to support daily asteroid identification activities.

You will gain hands-on experience with orbital dynamics, large datasets, and modern scientific software development, contributing to an operational prototype within the Planetary

Qualifications

• Solid Python programming skills, including scientific libraries (NumPy, Pandas, Astropy).
• Pursuing a university degree in Astronomy, Astrophysics, Physics, or Planetary Science.
• Ability to work with large datasets and perform data analysis.

Responsibilities

• Develop a software tool to automatically search asteroid identifications in observational databases.
• Build and validate a scalable pipeline to compare asteroid predictions with observations.
• Evaluate and rank potential matches using orbital uncertainty information.
• Contribute to an operational prototype for asteroid-monitoring activities.

Skills

Python programming

Scripting

Education

Astronomy/Astrophysics/Physics/Planetary Science degree

Tools

Python

NumPy

Pandas

Astropy

Job description

European Space Agency invites university students to participate in an internship focused on developing software to automatically identify asteroids in observational databases. You will build a scalable pipeline, compare predictions with data, and validate results to support daily asteroid identification activities.

You will gain hands-on experience with orbital dynamics, large datasets, and modern scientific software development, contributing to an operational prototype within the Planetary