Space probe proposal and climate research funding: News from Imperial

Illustration of a spacecraft in front of the Milky Way

The PRIMA mission

Here’s a batch of fresh news and announcements from across Imperial.

From a potential new space mission, to two new chunks of funding to study our changing climate, here is some quick-read news from across Imperial.

Space probe proposal

A proposal for a new astrophysics mission, involving Imperial researchers, has been selected for further study by NASA. The Probe far-Infrared Mission for Astrophysics (PRIMA) mission would study far-infrared wavelengths of light from space, which could answer questions about the origins and growth of planets, supermassive black holes, stars and cosmic dust.

Two images of a galaxy showing visible light and infrared light — Dust obscures the central active region of the Centaurus A galaxy from optical observatories, but far-IR light (right image) penetrates the dust and probes the active core as well as jets

PRIMA is one of two proposals that will receive $5million to conduct a 12-month mission concept study, before one will be chosen by NASA to become a $1billion probe mission, launching in 2032.

Team member Dr Dave Clements, from our Department of Physics, said: “PRIMA is a fantastic opportunity to build on our work with the Herschel Space Observatory, and to go much further in studying the cool, dusty universe, revealing the secrets of planet formation, the content of planetary atmospheres, and finding how galaxies and supermassive black holes evolved together.”

UK project partners, funded by the UK Space Agency, include Imperial, the University of Sussex, Cardiff University and STFC RAL Space.

Renewed environmental funding

The National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO) has secured five years of renewed funding from the Natural Environment Research Council. The award was as part of £103 million support for the work of leading UK environmental research centres.

The Earth from space overlaid with a network Professor Helen Brindley, from the Department of Physics at Imperial, is a Divisional Director of NCEO, leading work on the Energy and Water Cycles. She said: “UKRI's investment will allow NCEO to continue to underpin Imperial's world-leading work investigating the Earth's changing Energy and Water cycles.

“Complementing the European Space Agency's FORUM mission, a particular focus will be the development and scientific exploitation of novel instrumentation capable of measuring the Earth's energy spectrum in the far-infrared, a relatively under-explored region that can deliver unique information about our current climate, how rapidly it is changing, and why.”

Global climate impact

Dr Paulo Ceppi, from our Department of Physics, has been awarded a £100,000 Philip Leverhulme Prize from the Leverhulme Trust.

A variety of clouds in the sky The funds will support a project looking at recent reductions in global cloudiness and changing patterns of sea-surface temperatures, which have contributed to global warming. It’s hypothesised that these changes are linked to the tropical lower stratosphere – the layer of the atmosphere just above the troposphere, where most of our weather occurs.

This layer has been cooling in recent decades, driven by rising greenhouse gas concentrations and decreasing ozone concentrations. However, how this impacts the troposphere, and resulting cloudiness and sea-surface temperatures, is less well understood.

The prize will allow Dr Ceppi to bring in Dr Aleena Moolakkunnel Jaison, who will investigate this phenomenon with a combination of climate models and observations, to see if they can identify a causal link.