L’excellence passionnément
Space System Professor, Deputy Scientific Director
I have been a professor in space systems at ISAE-Supaero since 2007, and since March 1st 2024, Deputy Director of Research and Educational Resources. I was previously the head of the Electronics, Optronics, and Signal Department, responsible for the third-year program "Earth Observation and Sciences of the Universe," and co-responsible for the Master’s in Astrophysics at the University of Toulouse.
I graduated from Supaéro and Paul Sabatier University (in Astrophysics) in 1993 and began my career in industry (Airbus DS and Alcatel Espace) before joining the CNRS and then ISAE-Supaero in 2007. I obtained my Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches in Astrophysics in 2019 and was an auditor of the 75th session of the Institut des Hautes Études de Défense Nationale, defense policy option.
For ISAE-SUPAERO, I have participated in several missions selected by NASA, ESA, and CNES (the French space agency). Initially, I was the project manager and systems engineer for the Martian seismometer SEIS, which flew aboard the NASA Insight mission, and then co-investigator in charge of overall performance. I also developed, with my colleagues from DEOS, the first CubeSat of ISAE-Supaero, EntrySat, which was launched in 2019 from the International Space Station. I spent a year as a visiting researcher at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory/Caltech in 2013-2014 ; I am also a collaborator on the NASA Mars Rover Perseverance (Mars 2020), responsible for providing the first Martian microphone (made at the School) and its scientific exploitation.
My professional career has been marked by a constant passion for astronautics, space exploration, and instrumentation, and my solid engineering training has been the key to my successes. I am convinced that space exploration offers infinite opportunities for collaboration, discovery, innovation, and generally inspires us to push our limits.
Together with my colleagues Raphael Garcia and Naomi Murdoch, we created the SSPA (Space Systems for Planetology and its Applications) research team in the DEOS department, which focuses mainly on the design of space missions and instruments for the geophysical exploration of the solar system. It is a great pride.
Our community at ISAE-SUPAERO faces significant challenges in the coming years. In the medium term, the predictable acceleration of climate change and its major systemic impacts, combined with an increasingly "rough" international environment, are leading us into an era where scientific knowledge and technological innovation will become absolute imperatives, particularly in our field of aeronautics and space. We must make a decisive contribution, in collaboration with our local and international partners.
In this context, we must continue our efforts and amplify the integration of high-level research into our engineering and Master’s programs to meet the needs of the sector, all within an international environment that is not lacking in formidable competitors. In the short term, the merger with ENAC and the overhaul of our curricula are clearly steps in the right direction.
Currently, I am contributing to two projects under selection : one for the European Space Agency (ESA) to implement a microphone on the ExoMars descent module, which should survive one or two days on the surface of Mars, and another, in collaboration with JPL-Caltech, IPGP, and CNES, where we are working on deploying a seismometer on the Moon by the astronauts of the Artemis mission. But our longer-term goal is to propose a balloon mission to Venus, again with JPL, to better understand its history.
InSight Mission
co-Investigateur de la mission InSight du JPL.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAorZFLVH8M
Proposed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, InSight (Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) aims to deploy a geophysical station on the surface of the Red Planet to study the structure and composition of Mars’ interior. The objective is to better understand the formation and evolution of Mars by providing insights into its internal structure, which is still poorly understood. Using sophisticated geophysical instruments, InSight measures Mars’ seismic activity, internal heat flow, and subtle rotational variations.
The SEIS (Seismic Experiment for Interior Structures) instrument listens to the "heartbeat" of the planet by taking precise measurements of marsquakes and other internal activities, helping to better understand Mars’ history and structure.
L’instrument SEIS : un véritable défi technologique
A true technological challenge, the SEIS seismometer was developed in France by a technical and scientific team from CNES, the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris (CNRS/Université Paris Diderot), the Space Campus of the Université Paris Diderot, the Institut Supérieur de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace (ISAE), and the company SODERN. Several European and American laboratories (the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH), the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS) in Lindau, Imperial College London, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California) also contributed to this technological development, along with the Toulouse-based company EREMS.
Other CNRS laboratories and French universities have been involved in data analysis (LPG Nantes, IRAP Toulouse).
The Mars Microphone onboard SuperCam
This sensor is the result of a collaboration between ISAE-SUPAERO, responsible for the development and delivery of this microphone, and CNES, which oversees its project management.
This new instrument is integrated into SUPERCAM, an enhanced version of CHEMCAM, which has been in service on the Curiosity rover for four years, studying the geological diversity of Mars from a distance.
The Mars Microphone is located on the rover’s mast to benefit from its unique pointing capabilities. This new instrument pursues several original scientific and technical objectives :
Studying the sound associated with laser impacts on Martian rocks to better understand their surface mechanical properties.
Improving our knowledge of surface atmospheric phenomena : wind turbulence, dust devils, and interactions between the wind and the rover itself.
Understanding the sound signature of various rover movements : operations of the robotic arm and mast, driving on normal or rough Martian terrain, monitoring pumps, etc.
Social Networks
https://bsky.app/profile/moonnext.bsky.social
