Intern in the Space Medicine Team

Internship Opportunity in the Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration Programmes.

ESA is an equal opportunity employer, committed to achieving diversity within the workforce and creating an inclusive working environment. We therefore welcome applications from all qualified candidates irrespective of gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, beliefs, age, disability or other characteristics. Applications from women are encouraged.

Location Cologne

Our team and mission

This position is based at the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) - Near Cologne, Germany

Based at the European Astronaut Centre (EAC), ESA’s Space Medicine Team (SMT) comprises medical doctors, biomedical engineers, exercise physiologists, psychologists, IT specialists, administrators and project managers. Each plays a vital role in ensuring the health and well-being of astronauts during all stages of a mission.

To better support astronauts during current missions to the International Space Station and prepare for human missions beyond low Earth orbit, the Space Medicine Team is working to identify, evaluate and develop new space technologies and procedures. This process involves collaborating with ESA’s technology teams and Human Research Office to identify existing space-relevant technologies and scientific knowledge, and looking outside of ESA at terrestrial technology developments and the wealth of current science knowledge concerning human health. The Space Medicine Team work in close partnership with national space agencies, industry, research institutions and universities from across ESA’s Member States.

For more information on Space Medicine, please visit: ESA - Space Medicine

For further information visit our web site: http://www.esa.int

Field(s) of activity for the internship

You can choose between the following topics:

1) Topic 1: Astronaut Medical Data Management Procedure Enhancement

To abide to the new Astronaut Medical Data management policy, there is the requirement for the Space Medicine Team to establish processes and ensure that these processes are well documented. The primary objective of this internship is to collaboratively work on improving our procedures to manage astronaut medical data to ensure data accuracy, accessibility, and security.

During this internship, you will first:
• Assess the existing processes
• Improve the way the existing processes are documented, by using collaborative supports (e.g., SharePoint or Teams)
• Create comprehensive documentation detailing the updated data management procedures, making it easy for team members to follow best practices.

Through this experience, you will benefit from a hands-on experience in data process management.

Secondly, you will conduct a thorough evaluation of the current practices put in place to ensure the continuous improvement of the healthcare system of the space medicine team called AMD (Astronaut Medical Database).

You will identify areas of improvement, and collaborate with our Data management team to define/create new ways:
• To manage requests for new features
• To evaluate user experience.
• To support the development/improvement of “procedure cards” (from the existing support documentation) dedicated to each role.

Through this experience, you will learn how to implement a health information system in a unique environment.

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2) Topic 2: Radiation health risk assessment: managing crowdsourcing campaign, data analysis, screening of scientific papers and piloting data extraction

Space radiation is one of the major hazards of spaceflight. To ensure safe crewed space exploration, ESA Space Medicine Team has been working on improving astronaut health risk assessment, that will help predict and prevent health detriment due to radiation exposure on missions to the Moon and beyond. It requires maximizing the usage of existing scientific evidence, by synthetizing and analyzing existing data on radiation responses in living organisms. This internship will support the crowdsourcing campaign through managing and interacting with the crowd, preparing training tools, monitoring crowd’s progress, and analyzing the progress data.

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3) Topic 3: Radiation health risk assessment: developing Machine Learning Tool to support literature screening to select scientific evidence for risk model

Space radiation is one of the major hazards of spaceflight. To ensure safe crewed space exploration, ESA Space Medicine Team has been working on improving astronaut health risk assessment, that will help predict and prevent health detriment due to radiation exposure on missions to the Moon and beyond. It requires maximizing the usage of existing scientific evidence, by synthetizing and analyzing existing data on radiation responses in living organisms. This internship will focus on developing and improving machine learning tool for processing natural language, to select scientific evidence further fed into risk assessment tool.

Behavioural competencies

Result Orientation
Operational Efficiency
Fostering Cooperation
Relationship Management
Continuous Improvement
Forward Thinking

Education

You must have student status and be enrolled at university for the entire duration of the internship. You should preferably be in your final or second to last year of a university course at master’s level in a technical or scientific discipline.

Additional requirements

The working languages of the Agency are English and French. A good knowledge of one of these is required. Knowledge of another Member State language would be an asset.

Additional Requirements:

1) Topic 1:

• We are seeking a student pursuing a Master’s degree in Information Technology for Healthcare, Biomedical Engineering, Data Management or any related discipline
• In addition, strong analytical and problem-solving skills, familiarity with the healthcare system and its data management principles are an asset

  2) Topic 2:

  • Biological, medical, or biotechnological background with data analysis (coding) skills

    3) Topic 3:

    • Data science, machine learning, data analysis. Coding skills are mandatory

      Other information

      For behavioural competencies expected from ESA staff in general, please refer to the ESA Competency Framework.

      If you require support with your application due to a disability, please email contact.human.resources@esa.int.

      Internships can take place remotely, on-site or partially on-site depending on the pandemic situation, and in line with the relevant Establishment’s policy (e.g. possible Green Pass requirement) applicable at the time of starting the internship.

      Please note that applications are only considered from nationals of one of the following States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Nationals from Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Slovenia, as Associate Member States, or Canada as a Cooperating State, can apply as well as those from Bulgaria, Croatia and Cyprus as European Cooperating States (ECS).