→ GSTP ANNUAL REPORT 2011 - ESA

Ao activities initiated in 2011
Development of a portable, integrated Point-of-Care
Diagnostics Platform for multiplexed Assays
Point-of-Care (POC) medical diagnostics have demonstrated significant utility
in a variety of settings. Most relevant to ESA‘s immediate needs is the health
monitoring of astronauts in space.
The goal of this project is to demonstrate the technologies necessary for a
Point-of-Care diagnostics platform for performing hematologic, clinical chemistry
and immunological tests on whole blood. The resulting prototype will
consist of a microfluidic disc, an instrument, reagents that perform a representative
immunoassay and it will carry out the steps for a bead-based
immunoassay with detection in a rotating flow channel.
Three broad technologies must be integrated through this project to demonstrate
a representative assay: bead-based immunoassays, centrifugal microfluidics,
sensor technology and associated optics system. These must
be brought together under unified instrument control. The default detection
system will consist of a laser as an illumination source, an optical system
consisting of custom and commercial-of-the-self components for delivering
radiation to the disc and fluorescence from the disc and the silicon photomultiplier
assembly with integrated filters.
SArAS- fast Satellite Acquisition System
Usually satellite positions can be calculated through the use of orbital propagators.
These positions are then set in the initial pointing of dish antennas
as an aid for fast acquisition. However, those techniques are generally
designed for stable or final orbits, with decreasing precision in some critical
scenarios where too much inherent uncertainty makes the estimation system
less reliable.
The main goal of this Announcement of Opportunity is to develop an acquisition
aid system for large TTC antennas that can work at lower Signal to Noise
Ratios (SNR) than current ones. SARAS project uses phased array antennas
and digital signal processing in order to electronically get an estimate of the
Telemetry signal’s direction of arrival with super-resolution algorithms. Such
an estimate can be obtained in a relatively short time with acceptable accuracy
even at low input SNR.
This project will enable fast acquisition of satellites/launchers in Launch and
Early Orbit Phase. It will allow to speed up the acquisition in operational
stages of satellites in nominal orbits and to obtain the position of closely
spaced satellites
Advanced Particle filters
The objective of this activity is the development of a family of advanced particle
filters for chemical and electric propulsion, qualified for operation. The
filters are developed for absolute ratings in the 2-20 μm range, and for the
most commonly used gaseous and liquid propellants such as Xenon, Nitrogen,
Hydrazine, MON/NTO, and High Performance Green Propellant (HPGP).
The key technology behind the filter disk is MEMS (Micro-Electro-Mechanical
System). The MEMS technology enables manufacturing of well-defined miniature
structures with extreme precision and repeatability. For the filter application,
MEMS technology is ideally suited to manufacture millions of small
channels, passages, holes, etc. in the micron scale with tight tolerances.
Adding to the fact that manufacturing is highly automated and parallel (batch
processing), the filters can be manufactured at reasonable cost.
The activity is in its first phase during which gaseous particle filters should
be built. The second phase of the activity will be dealing with particle filters
for liquid propellants
Gaseous particle filters are frequently used for pressurant gases on the high
pressure side of liquid propulsion systems. The pressurants are normally helium
or nitrogen. Other common applications are found in electric propulsion
systems and cold gas systems using xenon, nitrogen and other inter gases
as propellants.
> Project concept of comsumable disk with reagent
> Sketch of the SARAS system
With the participation of Ireland
With the participation of Spain
With the participation of Sweden
> Bread board model of a MEMS-based stacked-disk filter
GSTP Annual Report 2011 | 13