Space Safety Intern: Asteroid Identification Pipeline

European Space Agency - ESA; Frascati; On-site; EUR 13,000 - 18,000; Part time

Job summary

ESA’s Space Safety Department in Frascati, Italy, is offering an internship in the Planetary Defence Office. You will work on developing a software pipeline to identify asteroids by comparing predictions with large observation datasets, using real astronomical data and modern orbit analysis techniques.

You will learn how asteroid observations inform orbital solutions, uncertainty propagation, and scalable scientific software design, with an emphasis on transforming research concepts into an

Qualifications

• Solid Python programming skills, including working with scientific libraries (NumPy, Pandas, Astropy).
• Degree track in astronomy, astrophysics, physics, planetary science, or related field.
• Willingness to enrol at university for entire duration of the internship.

Responsibilities

• Contribute to design, implementation and validation of an automated asteroid identification pipeline.
• Develop software components for processing asteroid observation data.
• Evaluate and rank potential matches using orbital uncertainty information.
• Validate pipeline performance with historical asteroid data and simulations.
• Contribute to an operational prototype for integration into asteroid-monitoring activities.

Skills

Python programming

NumPy

Pandas

Astropy

Education

Degree in astronomy/astrophysics/physics/planetary science

Job description

ESA’s Space Safety Department in Frascati, Italy, is offering an internship in the Planetary Defence Office. You will work on developing a software pipeline to identify asteroids by comparing predictions with large observation datasets, using real astronomical data and modern orbit analysis techniques.

You will learn how asteroid observations inform orbital solutions, uncertainty propagation, and scalable scientific software design, with an emphasis on transforming research concepts into an