Are you interested in applying? If so these are the steps to be followed:

• Form a team of 4-8 people with other university students who would be interested in participating in this programme. Try to include people from different disciplines and ensure that the team has a good range of skills addressing the many different tasks involved. For example:
  • A project manager to oversee the project time, technical and financial management.
  • A scientist to define the parameters of the experiment and interpret the measurements.
  • A mechanical engineer to design and build the structure.
  • An electronics engineer to design and manufacture the circuit boards.
  • A software engineer to program the commands and data storage.
  • Someone with good communication skills to develop and execute a successful outreach programme.
• Read the technical overviews of REXUS and/or BEXUS to understand what is possible within the constraints of the launch vehicle.
• Define your project, discuss it with the rest of the team and try to find references in the scientific literature to similar or related research projects.
• Identify an endorsing professor or academic supervisor whose role will be to supervise the work of your team.
• Find additional support like institutes, senior scientists and sponsors. You will probably need to use laboratories and specialised tools during the development and testing phases and you will almost certainly need advice when unforeseen problems arise.
• Consider how much the project will cost and how you will raise the funds for materials, testing facilities and travel of any unsponsored team members.
• Register on the ESA Education Office's project portal. Your endorsing professor and all the team members should also register on this portal.
• Download from the project portal the Word format of the Experiment Proposal Form and fill it in.
• Access the project portal, apply for the programme and upload the Experiment Proposal Form.
• If you are a citizen of a Cooperating State, obtain a letter of endorsement from your national agency stating that you will be supported financially throughout the programme. Contact ESA’s Education Office for further details if needed.

SNSB/ESA proposals will be assessed by a panel of experts. Pre-selected experiments will be invited to participate in a selection workshop at ESTEC where a final selection will be made.

Questions and contact details

If you have questions about the programme you can contact us by e-mail. However, due to the large number of e-mails we receive, you are asked to read carefully all the relevant web pages on www.rexusbexus.net before asking a question to which the answer may already be available online. Please ensure that any e-mail sent to us includes a clear and concise subject line.

If you cannot find the information you are looking for, please contact us at: rexus-bexus @ esa.int.