Empowerment is a useful word when it comes to the thinking of Prof David Southwood, the European Space Agency's new appointee as director of science. He believes that the ESA programme should be guided by the scientific community and wants scientists to play a part in agency planning.
Prof Southwood paid a flying visit to Dublin last week, part of a series of meetings now underway with government officials in all ESA member states. He met the Minister of State for Science, Technology and Commerce, Mr Noel Treacy, on Wednesday and later gave a thought-provoking presentation to some of Ireland's top space scientists during a talk at the Royal Irish Academy.
He believes the agency's science programme should in large measure come directly from the scientific community. He sees the agency's role as putting hardware into space, but believes that scientists in all member states should be the ones deciding what the hardware does once it gets there.
"I want the science to come from the `scientific' community and to be done by the community," he said. "The programme of the agency does grow out of the scientific community." The government ministries who decide how much to invest in ESA's budgets don't understand what is important for scientists and science, he added.
He was also encouraging about the role Irish scientists could play despite our relatively low national level of investment in ESA activities. "You are not held back by being in a small country. You can have a real impact," he said.
In fact scientists here have a remarkably good record of participation in major ESA satellite projects. We had Irish designed instruments flying on the Giotto probe to Halley's Comet. We were involved in the SOHO solar observatory which has been monitoring solar flares during the current solar maximum and also in the ISO infrared astronomy satellite.
The CLUSTER satellites launched last year included an Irish scientific contribution as will forthcoming missions including INTEGRAL, a gamma-ray observatory, Mars Express, the European exploration mission to the Red Planet, and the ROSETTA probe, a satellite that will drop a lander on the Comet Wirtanen.
Prof Southwood views the scientific capabilities that go into these flights as a "strategic asset". Space science matters, he argues, and is pressing this message with ESA government ministers during his current round of meetings.
Having a strong European research base in the space sciences ensures we collectively retain our technological independence, demonstrates technological capabilities and vision and supports science education. "If Europe is going to sell its services and manufactured products it is important for Europe to be seen as the leading knowledge based economy in the world," he said.
Research and involvement in space is also a part of what we are. "It is a central human activity, to explore, to push to the limit." It also brings unexpected discoveries. "It is like throwing seed corn down. You don't know where it is going to come up. If you throw no seed corn, nothing will come up."
HIS main concern during his four-year term will be maintaining budgets for ongoing ESA projects. He painted a bleak picture of what could be lost if budget levels were maintained but no additional contribution was made to keep pace with inflation.
It could mean switching off already launched and scientifically productive satellites such as ISO and SOHO. He also believes that scientists in all ESA countries have a role to play in making sure this doesn't happen by lobbying their political leaders. "Scientists have to make this message clear," he said, that basic science underpins applied science and that investment enables this to happen.
Two ESA missions in particular should capture the public imagination in the next few years. Mars Express will visit Mars but also drop the Beagle2 lander on the surface. Beagle2 will be roving the Martian surface by 2004, a short time before Europeans drop their second extraterrestrial lander, this time on Saturn's moon Titan.
The Cassini satellite will go into orbit around Titan by 2004 and will release the Huygens probe which will descend to Titan's surface. The challenge, Prof South wood said, was we don't know what to expect, whether the surface will be solid or instead an ocean of liquid methane.
Prof Southwood takes over on May 1st from Prof Roger-Maurice Bonnet who gave long and distinguished service as director of science at ESA for 17 years. Prof Southwood and many of the scientists at the meeting praised the contribution made by Prof Bonnet.