Irish role in European Space Agency highlighted

The Minister for Science, Technology & Innovation, Mr. Conor Lenihan, T.D. officially opened the INTEGRAL international conference in Dublin Castle today (Monday 27 September 2010). He outlined how Ireland’s membership of the European Space Agency (ESA) plays an important role in our efforts to succeed as a knowledge economy.

Minister Lenihan highlighted the important contribution of Irish scientists and companies to the work of the European Space Agency, commenting that:

'Ireland’s membership of the European Space Agency provides excellent opportunities for commercialisation of research outputs and in the last ten years has assisted over 50 Irish companies to secure ESA contracts worth over €60M.'

Minister Lenihan added, 'The Government’s strategy, as implemented by Enterprise Ireland has encouraged a growing number of high technology companies emerging in this sector and developed a strong reputation in Europe for bringing highly advanced and innovative technologies to the space programme.'

For the past eight years, as part of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Horizon 2000 Science Programme, INTEGRAL (the International Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory) has conducted scientific observations of the Universe from an orbit more than 60,000km above the Earth. It is the first space observatory that can simultaneously observe objects in gamma rays, X-rays, and visible light.

Over the course of the conference from 27 – 30 September, delegates will be presented with the latest data from INTEGRAL.

The catalogue of information produced by the European Space Agency (ESA) satellite provides insights into the most violent and exotic objects in the Universe: black holes, neutron stars, supernovae and active galactic nuclei (AGNs); located at distances approximately 652 to 980 million light-years away from Earth,' says Professor Lorraine Hanlon, UCD School of Physics, University College Dublin.

Ireland has been a member of the ESA since 1975.  The Irish companies that have secured contracts with the ESA represent a range of industrial sectors including: ICT, materials, engineering, electronics, and optoelectronics. By developing technologies through ESA programmes, Irish industry can leverage direct commercial sales in aerospace and other worldwide markets.