Erasmus Centre: photo gallery
A photo gallery of the Erasmus Centre High Bay (a 900 m2 exhibition area, with many items and models on display). The gallery also includes some of the facilities and activities, including workshops, astronaut training, spacecraft, USOC and 3D payloads.
The Erasmus Centre features a 900 m2 exhibition area, with many items on display, including a 1:10 scale model of the complete International Space Station, 1:1 models of the European Columbus laboratory and the Russian Zvezda module, a real Russian Foton capsule and ESA’s Atmospheric Reentry Demonstrator capsule, that have both flown in space. Among other things, the area includes a User Information Centre about the Mars500 study.
In the foreground, 1:5 models of the Columbus Laboratory, and Node2 Harmony, among the most important contributions of Europe to the International Space Station. In the Background, a 1:1 mockup of the Zvezda Service Module of the ISS.
Potential users can see a realistic 3D graphic representation of the International Space Station in combination with unique high-resolution 3D pictures in our Virtual Reality Theatre. The theatre can host up to 25 visitors.
One of the highlights of the Erasmus Centre's High Bay is a 1:1 Columbus Laboratory mockup. It displays on the inside all the relevant racks and experiment facilities being currently mounted in the Laboratory on the ISS. On the outside, more technical relevant details are supplied with the aid of exhibit stands and factsheets.
Foton spacecraft are based on Russian Vostok spacecraft in which Yuri Gagarin orbited the Earth in 1961. They comprise three sections: a battery module at the front end, a spherical recoverable capsule, and a service module at the rear. ESA has been participating in Foton missions since 1991 and the Foton-M3 mission is the ninth with ESA involvement. This on display is one capsule that was on a return trip to space.
The Multimedia Library is one of the key places of the Erasmus Centre, it features an extra-size video wall. It is used for workshops and technical meetings requiring advanced displaying and communication capabilites, such as video conferences and interactive/remote lectures. The Multimedia Library was used as Mission Control Centre in past missions to the ISS, as seen in the picture, but is currently not existing in this configuration.
The Microgravity Science Glovebox enables astronauts on board the ISS to perform a wide variety of materials, combustion, fluids and biotechnology experiments as well as investigations in the microgravity environment. It can also accommodate minor repairs and servicing of hardware requiring a controlled working environment. This is dutch astronaut Andre Kuipers being trained on the engineering model of the facility, in the Erasmus Centre.
The Erasmus Centre hosts one of ESA's USOCs (User Support and Operations Centres) for the International Space Station. Among other tasks, the Erasmus USOC at ESTEC is the Facility Responsible Centre for the European Drawer rack, with the Belgian USOC in Brussels and the Dutch Utilisation centre in Emmeloord acting as Facility Support Centres.
The Erasmus Recording Binocular is an Erasmus Centre developed payload: a 3D video camera that was used to take images of the environment on the International Space Station (ISS). The images were used to create an accurate map of the interior of ISS and for educational/promotional purposes. The image depicts the next version, ERB-2, that will be launched to the ISS in the near future.
The Erasmus Centre features a complete control room for mixing and switching between audio-video signals from several sources, real-time, and is able to produce live multicam events, using either internal locations (i.e. Auditorium, Multimedia Library) or remote feeds (i.e. satellites).
Last update: 6 July 2011
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