Javier Pérez-Álvarez

Universidad Politécnica de Madrid | UPM · Departamento de Vehículos Aeroespaciales

Additive manufacturing has profoundly influenced the aerospace industry since its inception , offering unmatched design freedom, cost reduction, rapid prototyping, and enhanced supply-chain efficiency. High-performance polymers like ULTEM™ and PEEK have emerged, known for their strength, temperature resistance, chemical resistance, and lightweight...

Ariel is the fourth medium-sized mission (M4) selected under ESA's Cosmic Vision 2015-2025 programme, and is scheduled for launch in 2029. The thermal design is based on a passive and active cooling approach. To take advantage of the thermal conditions of the L2 orbit, a combination of a V-groove shield and a radiator coupled to deep space will be...

The thermal analysis of stratospheric balloon payloads is still a complex task due to the variable thermal environment during the flight phases as well as due to the convective effects during the ascent. An experiment named HERCCULES has been successfully launched from Esrange Space Centre (Kiruna, Sweden) in September 2023 as part of the REXUS/BEX...

3D printing can be used to manufacture metallic, ceramic and polymer materials. The materials used in additive manufacturing are a major challenge in manufacturing-oriented engineering processes as the final objective is that the properties of these materials reach levels similar to those of the materials used in classical manufacturing processes....

In the present paper, the UPMQube PocketQube proposal for the EU2Space challenge is described. This proposal has been developed by a group of master's degree students led by Ph.D. students and professors from the Instituto Universitario de Microgravedad "Ignacio Da Riva" (IDR/UPM) at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM). PocketQube is a recent n...

Ariel (Atmospheric Remote-Sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large Survey) is the adopted M4 mission in the framework of the ESA “Cosmic Vision” program. Its purpose is to conduct a survey of the atmospheres of known exoplanets through transit spectroscopy. Launch is scheduled for 2029. Ariel scientific payload consists of an off-axis, unobscured Cassegrai...

The Thermal Analysis Support and Environment Characterization Laboratory (TASEC-Lab) is an experiment designed, integrated, and tested in the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid by bachelor's, master's and doctoral students. The aim of this project is to study the convection heat transfer, the thermal environment and the balloon dynamics during the a...

En este trabajo se muestra de forma resumida el proceso de monitorización y mantenimiento, entendiendo por éste el equilibrado, de la batería del satélite universitario UPMSat-2. Este proceso fue empleado a lo largo de un extenso periodo, ya que entre la entrega de la batería por el fabricante y el lanzamiento del satélite transcurrieron más de cin...

In the present paper, the UPMQube PocketQube proposal for the EU2Space challenge is described. This proposal has been developed by a group of master's degree students led by Ph.D. students and professors from the Instituto Universitario de Microgravedad "Ignacio Da Riva" (IDR/UPM) at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM). PocketQube is a recent n...

In combination with magnetometers, solar sensors are one of the most used instruments for determining the attitude of small satellites. These devices use the photoelectric effect to produce an electrical current. This electrical current, or the voltage associated with the electrical circuit of the solar sensor, is measured in order to compute the a...

This work describes the successful education experience for five years of space engineering education at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM), Madrid, Spain. The MSc. in Space Systems (MUSE, Máster Universitario en Sistemas Espaciales) is a 2-year and 120-ECTS (European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System) master program organized by the...

PIRAMIDE aimed at boosting academic results from Bachelor and Master students by doing research on space engineering. This project was carried out by professors from the IDR/UPM Institute and the STRAST group. The program was structured into five different case studies: 1) design of a space mission (phase 0/A) in a Concurrent Design Facility (CDF);...

The ARIEL mission is a space project consisting of a spacecraft with the goal of detecting exoplanets and observing the characteristics of their atmospheres. One of the main sub-systems of the payload is the telescope that must operate under cryogenic conditions to guarantee its adequate performance and the mission success. One of the critical aspe...

PIRAMIDE aimed at boosting academic results from Bachelor and Master students by doing research on space engineering. This project was carried out by professors from the IDR/UPM Institute and STRAST group. The program was structured into five different case studies: 1) Design of a space mission (phase 0/A) in a Concurrent Design Facility (CDF); 2)...

The UPMSat-2 micro-satellite was launched on September the 3rd 2020 at 01:51:10 UTC from Kourou spaceport in French Guyana. The VV16 Vega Flight has been the first low Earth orbit rideshare commercial flight with a total of 53 satellites (7 of them micro-satellites) to be released by the launch vehicle, arranged in the modular SSMS (Small Spacecraf...

The Master in Space Systems (Máster Universitario en Sistemas Espaciales-MUSE) at UPM (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid) is an academic program organized at Instituto Universitario de Microgravedad "Ignacio Da Riva" (IDR/UPM) research institute. This is a 2-year Project Based Learning (PBL) master program which started in 2014. Since the first yea...

This paper presents the development of the UPMSat-2 sun sensor, from the design to on-orbit operation. It also includes the testing of the instrument, one of the most important tasks that needs to be performed to operate a sensor with precision. The UPMSat-2 solar sensor has been designed , tested, and manufactured at the Universidad Politécnica de...

By the end of 2019, Technical University of Madrid (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid - UPM) from Spain granted support to the 1-year innovative educational project PIRAMIDE, within the call for projects Innovative Education Program of UPM . PIRAMIDE aimed at boost academic results from Bachelor and Master students by doing research on space engine...

Ariel, the Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey, was adopted as the fourth medium-class mission in ESA's Cosmic Vision programme to be launched in 2029. During its 4-year mission, Ariel will study what exoplanets are made of, how they formed and how they evolve, by surveying a diverse sample of about 1000 extrasolar planets, s...

Space systems require technologies intended for power generation and management most of the time. Within the Electric Power Subsystem, one or a group of several batteries conform the secondary power source of a space mission. In this work, the initial design of a Li-ion battery for small spacecraft, based on Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) cells, i...

El satélite universitario UPMSat-2 fue lanzado el 2 de septiembre de 2020 desde la Guayana Francesa en un vehículo lanzador VEGA, dentro de la misión VV16, que incluía la puesta en órbita de 7 micro-satélites y 46 nano-satélites. Con este hito se completaba la primera parte de una misión que comenzó oficialmente en 2011, y que había sido precedida...

Nowadays most universities are focused in the development and use of innovative educational programs, in a search for improvements in their academic plans. Within innovative educational techniques, Research-Based Learning (RBL) is focused on the generation of didactic experiences based on the scientific method (questions formulation, finding of ans...

The last integration and testing procedures of the UPMSat-2 are described in this presentation.

The design process of an Electrical Power Subsystem (EPS) for a space mission is a key factor in order to be successful. During last decades, components included in this subsystem have been progressively released from a more and more wide range of suppliers. This fact has allowed access to the space power technologies to an increased number of user...

The UPMSat-2 is the second satellite designed and developed by the IDR/UPM as part of the UPM-Sats program. It is a scientific micro satellite of 45 kg whose aim is providing the required know-how to design, develop, manufacture, integrate, test and finally operate a complete space system. Furthermore, it serves as on orbit demonstration platform f...

In recent years, the development of small-size satellites by companies, research institutions and universities have become common practice. This terend is based on the need for providing an easy and low-cost access to space for those institutions and companies that cannot afford the use of the usual big industrial platforms. In this context, the ID...

As a result of the reporting of casual observations of the oscillation or rotation of the beacons in transmission line guard cables, some attention has been paid to the stability of the guard cables with beacons. The relatively more frequent observation of these motions has been explained in recent papers dealing with the elastic part of the proble...

A methodology to efficiently simulate wind tunnel tests of several airfoils with OpenFOAM has been developed in this work. This methodology bridges OpenFOAM capabilities with Matlab postprocessing to analyse efficiently the performance of wind turbine airfoils at any angle of attack. This technique has been developed to reduce the cost, in terms of...

In the present work, the UPMSat-2 satellite project is analyzed as an academic tool to involve different groups of students into a challenging and quite complete space engineering project, encouraging them not only to develop specific skills in relation to a single subsystem of the satellite, but also to harmonize their work with the results from o...

This is the presentation of the contribution to the 2nd Annual International Conference on Engineering Education & Teaching, June 2017, Athens (Greece). The work can be downloaded from: http://oa.upm.es/45973/

In the framework of a development project promoted by the European Space Agency (ESA/ESTEC), Airbus Defence & Space (EADS CASA Espacio, ECE) has designed, manufactured and tested a technology demonstrator representative of the payload adaptor (PLA) of VEGA Launcher, by using an anisogrid concept, called anisogrid payload adaptor (APA). This lattice...

In Spain, and most part of Europe, historically, space engineering education was a small part of a broader aerospace curriculum in aeronautics, dominated by fluid- and structures- focused engineering. The Spanish universities have entailed a profound renewal within the last years as a result of the European Space for Higher Education implementation...

In this paper, the experimental results of an unconventional joined-wing aircraft configuration are presented. The test model uses two different wings, forward and rear, both joined in tandem and forming diamond shapes both in plant and front views. The wings are joined in such a way that it is possible to change the rear wing dihedral angle values...

During the last few years of teaching the subject of Graphic Engineering, traditional teaching methods have been used based on lectures and solving any problems as they arose. In the opinion of the authors, this gave a rather compartmentalised overview of engineering design. Students were assessed solely by a final exam, the final mark only being s...

The flow topology on two scaled models (1:230 and 1:115) of the Bolund Island is analysed in two wind tunnels, focusing on the characteristics of the detachment pattern when the wind blows from 270° wind direction and the atmospheric condition is neutral. Since the experiments are designed as the simplest possible reference cases, no additional rou...

The Bolund experiment has been reproduced in a neutral boundary layer wind tunnel (WT) at scale 1:115 for two Reynolds numbers. All the results have been obtained for an incoming flow from the 270 o wind direction (transect B in the Bolund experiment jargon). Vertical scans of the velocity field are obtained using non-time resolved two components p...

The influence of anemometer rotor shape parameters, such as the cups' front area or their center rotation radius on the anemometer's performance was analyzed. This analysis was based on calibrations performed on two different anemometers (one based on magnet system output signal, and the other one based on an opto-electronic system output signal),...

Pressure measurements on the surface of a 1:230 scale model of Bolund Island are presented. The model is smooth and no roughness elements for boundary layer generation have been considered since the experiment is designed as the simplest possible reference case. Measurement have been taken for a range of Reynolds numbers based on the average undist...

Design and building of UAVs (for civil and military missions) is a field of actuation where the most important Universities, research Centers and Aeronautical designers have dedicated a lot of human effort. In recent years, a team of students and professors (at the Escuela Universitaria de Ingeniería Técnica Aeronáutica, EUITA) have been working on...

A teaching experiment was conducted with students of Graphic Engineering at Madrid Polytechnic University Aeronautical Engineering School to improve their professional development in cooperative engineering design tasks in an aeronautical company. A matrix-like company structure made up of departments interacting on different projects was created....