Stéphanie Cazaux and Niels Ligterink have received funding from NWO under the National Science Agenda (NWA) for their research project “The Search for Life on Icy Moons.” This project, part of NWA Route 15: Origins of Life – on Earth and in the Universe, focuses on how to sample material from the plumes escaping Enceladus’ …
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Edgar Steenstra from TU Delft has been awarded the Vening Meinesz Prize for Earth and Environmental Sciences. He receives the €10,000 prize for his innovative research on the formation and evolution of planets, particularly Venus and the Moon, as well as his role in international planetary missions. The award was presented on 20 March 2025 …
TU Delft is expanding its space research capabilities with the launch of four new and upgraded Space Engineering laboratories. These state-of-the-art facilities will provide researchers, students, and industry partners with advanced tools to push the boundaries of space exploration, planetary science, and satellite technology. Each laboratory serves a distinct purpose, from simulating extreme planetary environments …
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The NWO Domain Board Science has awarded twenty-one grant applications in the Open Competition Domain Science-M programme. M-grants are intended for innovative, high-quality, fundamental research and/or studies involving matters of scientific urgency. One of these projects was awarded to Dr. Edgar Steenstra (TU Delft) to invest in lab facilities study the origin of the largest …
Read more “Experimental insights into the origin of the largest lava river flows on Venus”
How can we detect if a planet or moon has the potential to harbour life? A new expertise network funded with 690 kEuro by the Netherlands Space Office will allow a consortium of Dutch researchers to find out during the next five years. The involvement of various research groups illustrates the broad, interdisciplinary nature of …
Read more “Kick-off for expertise network that will study habitability of planets and moons”
The interdisciplinary research consortium PRELIFE has been awarded an NWA grant by the Dutch Research Council (NWO) to investigate the origin of life on Earth and in the universe, one of science’s greatest unsolved puzzles. The consortium will receive €6.7 million to explore this question and comprises scientists from sixteen universities and research institutes across …
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Planetary scientist Sebastiaan de Vet of the Planetary Exploration group at TU Delft has received a Comenius Teaching Fellowship for his proposal to start developing a ‘Planetary Analogue Rock Collection’ (PARC) for use in courses of the Planetary Exploration MSc profile. By allowing students to work with terrestrial rocks and minerals that also occur on …
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Funding within the second call of the programme ‘Use of space infrastructure for Earth Observation and Planetary Research (GO)’ from 2022 will be divided among nine research projects. The funded research proposals encompass studies on, for example, air quality and climate models or the evolution and origin of Mercury. Various national and international space organisations …
The European Research Council (ERC) has announced the ERC Starting Grants for young researchers. One of them is joining the Planetary Exploration group at TU Delft: Edgar Steenstra to study volcanic processes on Venus. The European grant of € 2,228,075 for a five-year research programme is intended to enable Steenstra to build his own teams …
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Funding within the ‘Use of space infrastructure for Earth Observation and Planetary Research (GO)’ call is distributed among 15 research projects. The researchers will make substantial use of space infrastructure for their projects and will, among other things, conduct research on CO and CO2 emissions from forest and wildfires and volcanism on Mars. Various national …
Read more “4.5 million awarded to Earth observation and planetary research”