Science Operations Scientist (W203)

Job Requisition ID: 18881

Date Posted: 11 September 2024

Closing Date: 2 October 2024 23:59 CET/CEST

Publication: Internal & External

Type of Contract: Permanent

Directorate: Science

Workplace: Villanueva de la Cañada, ES

Grade Band: A2 - A4

Location: ESAC, Villanueva de la Cañada, Spain

The European Space Agency 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 Science Operations Department (SCI-S), within ESA's Directorate of Science, hosts the scientists and engineers that oversee the space missions from study to end of operations, develops the science operation systems for the missions and operates the missions in space, and archives and curates their data during operations and beyond. Its main objective is to maximise the scientific output of the missions for the benefit of humankind.

You will be assigned as Science Operations Scientist, initially for the Gaia mission, under the direct responsibility of the Mission Manager in the Mission Management and Science Operations Division within SCI-S.

Gaia will end its operational life in the first half of 2025, after which the mission's post-operations phase will begin. Four highly successful data releases (DRs) have been achieved so far, all of which were major, transformational events for the astronomical world. A fifth release, DR4, is currently being prepared for publication in 2026, and a final release, DR5, is expected to conclude the mission by the end of the decade. Gaia has a relatively long post-operations phase of five and a half years, reflecting the complexity of turning the basic observation data from 10.5 years of science operations into legacy data products of the highest quality.