about this event
In 1979, a young academic at the University of Surrey, Martin Sweeting, thought of building a new kind of spacecraft applying the latest developments in microelectronics. The satellite would be small, affordable, yet be capable of carrying out sophisticated space missions. The result was UoSAT-1, launched in 1981 by NASA. This was to be the start of a succession of spacecraft designed and built at the University and its spin-out company, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) – making “Surrey” the go-to destination for countries wanting to learn about this new way of “doing space”. What Surrey started more than 40 years ago; the world now calls Space 2.0. This is the story of how Surrey pioneered the “New Space” revolution.
Biographical Information about our Speaker:
Craig Underwood is Emeritus Professor of Spacecraft Engineering at the University of Surrey. He took his undergraduate degree in Physics with Computer Science at York and went on to teach Physics at Scarborough Sixth-Form College, where he first became involved with Surrey’s UoSAT satellites. In 1986, he joined Surrey as a researcher and later became a lecturer then professor, gaining his PhD in 1996. His career focused on spacecraft engineering, the space environment and remote-sensing instrumentation. He retired in 2019 to expand his work on the public understanding of science and engineering. He lives in Godalming with his wife, Hilary.