Our team and mission

ESA maintains a world-leading Science Programme with missions in heliophysics, planetary science, astrophysics and fundamental physics. Its mission is to 'empower Europe to lead space science'. The Department for Science and Operations hosts the scientists and engineers that oversee the space missions, from study to end of operations. It develops the science operation systems for the missions and operates the missions in space, as well as archiving and curating their data during operations and beyond. Our main objective is to maximise the scientific output of the missions for the benefit of humankind.

The European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC) near Madrid in Spain is ESA's centre for space science. It hosts the science operation centres for all ESA astronomy and planetary missions together with their scientific archives.

One of these missions, Euclid, will explore the geometry of the Universe with an imaging and spectroscopic survey of the extragalactic sky to understand dark matter and dark energy better. This mission will launch in July 2023 and our team of engineers and scientists will be tasked with overseeing its science operations. 

Although our team is small, we work closely with the large European Euclid Consortium in an international and diverse environment. As part of this project, you will be called upon to interact with different teams at ESAC and more broadly in the Euclid Consortium. 

Useful links:
•    Euclid: https://sci.esa.int/web/euclid
•    ESAC Science Data Centre: https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/esdc
•    ESA Datalabs: https://datalabs.esa.int/
•    ESASky: https://sky.esa.int/esasky/

You are encouraged to visit the ESA website: http://www.esa.int

Field(s) of activity/research for the traineeship

The Euclid mission will generate petabytes of data (images, catalogues, spectra and high-level cosmological products) that will be stored in the Euclid science archive. For that purpose, an archive system has been developed by the ESAC Science Data Centre, building on the experience of previous missions while making use of new database technologies for big data.

In parallel, ESA Datalabs, a cloud-based scientific and collaboration platform is under development to interact with the data and bring the software, pipelines or Jupyter Notebooks close to the archive. Euclid’s large dataset will not be downloaded easily, and some steps in its processing will require significant computing resources. This makes ESA Datalabs a very promising tool for the scientific exploitation of Euclid data.

Last, the ESAC Science Data Centre has also been developing ESASky, a multi-mission application making it possible to visualise, explore and download astronomical data, in particular from ESA missions. It will be well suited to the exploration of Euclid survey data in combination with data from other observatories in a multi-mission, multi-wavelength approach. 

The goal of this project is to facilitate the exploration and use of data from the Euclid science archive in ESA Datalabs and ESASky, first to members of the Euclid Consortium and then to the full astronomical community.

In a first stage, a portfolio of several Jupyter Notebooks is planned. By developing and sharing these interactive computational documents with the Euclid Consortium and the community, you will allow them to begin rapidly exploiting Euclid data without having to install and run any software on their devices, or even download the data. Notebooks would, for example, be used to:

• access Euclid data with astroquery modules and visualise it interactively;
• generate multiple image cut-outs;
• visualise and manipulate spectra;
• integrate PyEsaSky, an interactive widget allowing users to work with ESASky within a Jupyter Notebook.

In a second stage, adapting certain pipelines/tools from the Euclid Consortium is envisaged so that they can be further developed and/or rerun in ESA Datalabs, involving, for example: 

• spectra extraction (e.g. on extended sources) and interactive analysis;
• modified pipelines (e.g. preserving extended emission in the images);
• processing support, including access to machine learning resources.

​​​​​​​This project is at the frontier between several areas of data science and also between software development and Euclid science. It will pave the way to a new paradigm for accessing and manipulating state-of-the-art big data for one of the leading European scientific missions in the years to come. 

As a Young Graduate Trainee, you will be supported by data and archive experts from the ESAC Science Data Centre, the Euclid Science Operations Centre and the ESA Datalabs team. You will also interact with members of the Euclid Consortium, the future users of the tools you will be developing. We will work with you to make sure your experience with us at ESA will be of major benefit to your career plans.

Technical competencies

Behavioural competencies

Result Orientation

Operational Efficiency

Fostering Cooperation

Relationship Management

Continuous Improvement

Forward Thinking

Education

You should have just completed or be in the final year of your master’s degree in in software engineering, data science or similar.

Additional requirements

Knowledge of Python and Jupyter notebooks.

Some background in processing and/or visualisation of astronomical data would be a plus.

You should have good interpersonal and communication skills and should be able to work in a multi-cultural environment, both independently and as part of a team.

The working languages of the Agency are English and French. A good knowledge of one of these is required. Knowledge of another Member State language would be an asset.

During the interview, your motivation and overall professional career goals will also be explored.