CV: Space engineering researcher

2002 – 2005:

Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands). Master’s degree received on 19-05-2005 in the research group “Astrodynamics and satellite systems”.

1998 – 2002:

Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands). Bachelor’s degree received on 08-03-2002.

1992 – 1998:

Secondary school: Sint-Bavohumaniora - Ghent (Belgium)

Option “Mathematics-Sciences”.

Nov. 2006 – to date:

Researcher TUDelft: Modeling and control of interferometry null errors, with application to the Darwin mission.

September 2006:

Consultant of Science and Technology, Delft, working for TNO – Science and industry (Space division). Survey of Belgian-Dutch cooperation in the space market.

June 2005 – June 2006:

Young Graduate Trainee in the Science Payloads and Advanced Concepts Office (planetary exploration) at ESA – ESTEC. Support of the Geosail and the Cross-Scale technology reference studies.

Sept. 2003 – May 2005:

Graduation project in cooperation with TNO – Science and Industry about the impact of the space and satellite environment on the optical path differences of Darwin.

Feb. 2003 – May 2003:

Traineeship at ESOC: Mission Analysis. Work has been done on the use of FEEPs for GAIA.

Sept. 2000 – Dec. 2002:

Assistant in Engineering Mechanics (faculty of Aerospace engineering – TU Delft). My task was to correct exams of the 1^st and 2^nd year courses of mechanics, to supervise and assist students with additional clarification. I was also responsible for the educational internet pages of the mechanics course.

January 2007:

Kiruna winter course on Aurora Borealis and Cold Weather related phenomena.

Sept 2003, Oct 2005, Oct 2006:

Participation to the ESA Student IAF Programme 2003, 2005 and 2006.

July 23 – Aug. 1, 2002:

Participation to the Alpbach Summer School on Space Weather: Physics, Impacts and Predictions.

Sept. 2000 - Oct. 2000:

Participated and selected for the 3^rd ESA Parabolic Flight Campaign: Fluid research with main focus on the technical design of the equipment used.

June 2007:

Sir Hermann Bondi: A journey through his life and the early endeavours of Europe into space, Acta Astronautica, Volume 61, Issue 1-6, p. 514-525.

April 2006:

Co-author of the EGU2006 abstract, “ESA Technology Reference studies in the context of Cosmic Vision 1525”, Geophysical Research Abstracts, Vol. 8,  07281.

October 2005:

V.J. Sterken, A. Kamp, S. Kampen, T.C. van den Dool: 2005, “Impact of the space environment on Darwin and a Low Earth Orbit (LEO) demonstration mission”, paper at the International Astronautical Congress 2005, IAC-05-C.2.5.

May 19, 2005:

Master’s thesis at the Delft University of Technology: “Impact of the space and satellite environment on the optical path differences of Darwin”, (TNO report no. 050006).

April 30, 2003:

Mission Analysis Section Working Paper No. 458, “GAIA Mission Analysis: Use of FEEPs for orbit maintenance”.

July 2002:

Co-author of the report written during the Alpbach Summer School: “GLOTEC: Global real-time TEC-map Satellite Navigation System Reliability Forecast”.

2000:

Co-Author of the report on the Parabolic Flight Campaign experiment: “Technical Description and Strength Calculations of the Test Set-up for Micro-gravity Experiments in the 2000 ESA Parabolic Flight Campaign for Group 1023”. Delft University of Technology report no. FM&P-00.011 cat.h.

Fluent:

Dutch, English, French

Basic skills:

German

Good in MsWord, Excel, Latex and Matlab. Experience with Zemax, Fortran and IDL and comfortable in both the Windows as Unix environment.

I enjoy scuba diving, alpinism, mountainbiking, windsurfing, running, climbing, playing the guitar and sometimes the violin.

Strong interest in astronomy, space activities, ham radio and the history of science.