IASB - Institut d'Aéronomie Spatiale de Belgique

Dr. Valérie Wilquet is a researcher within the Planetary Aeronomy division at IASB. She received her degree in Chemistry in 1994 and her PhD degree in 2000 both from the Université Libre of Brussels. She has been involved from the beginning in the analysis of the spectra recorded by the SOIR instrument (on board the Venus Express mission). She is also responsible for the definition of the observation strategies of SOIR/VEx. She is co-I of the NOMAD instrument for the future ExoMars TGO 2016 mission. Her main research topic is the vertical distribution and microphysical and optical properties of aerosols in planetary atmospheres.

She will be responsible for the development of and implementation of the new modelling and retrieval technique concerning the terminator (WP6), as well as of the follow-up of the development of new tools for the detection of clouds on Mars (T4.5) and the determination of dust properties and impact on the retrieval of ozone (T5.3).

Dr. Lori Neary has a PhD on global modelling of the terrestrial atmosphere (York University, Canada, 2011). She joined IASB in 2009 after gaining 15 years of expertise in global atmospheric modelling at York University (Canada) in the team of J.C. McConnell123. She is an expert on the GEM atmospheric circulation model. Since 2009 working on the development of the GEM-Mars model for Mars. She is co-I of NOMAD/ExoMars TGO.

Dr. Neary will coordinate modelling of trace gases at the terminator (WP6).

Dr. Séverine Robert (F) has been working at the Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy since September 2009. She is part of the Planetary Aeronomy division at IASB and member of the SOIR/VEx and NOMAD/ExoMars teams. She holds a PhD in infrared spectroscopy obtained in 2009 at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. In the frame of the NOMAD project she is responsible for the coordination of the radiative transfer codes intercomparison and the development of the spectral database. She is also involved in an ESA General Studies Programme activity named SIROCCO (Synergetic SWIR and IR retrievals of near-surface concentrations of CH4 and CO for Earth and Mars). In this project, she works on radiative transfer algorithms to test synergetic retrievals on synthetic datasets.

Benefiting from these experiences, she will participate to the work of the development of new synergistic tools (WP1).

 

Dr. Arnaud Mahieux works on the data calibration pipeline, as well as the science investigation of the SOIR/VEx instrument. He is involved in the development of the SOIR data retrieval algorithm and in the analysis of the SOIR spectra for CO2, temperature and of trace gases. He is co-I of NOMAD/ExoMars TGO.
 
He will coordinate the improvement of the analysis of solar occultation observations (WP6).

Dr. Yannik Willame is a researcher at IASB since 2007. He joined the Planetary aeronomy division in 2009. He started his PhD thesis 2010 and obtained it in 2015 at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. He is also member of the NOMAD team. He is working on the study of ozone and aerosols present in the Martian atmosphere with ultraviolet measurements, first using SPICAM/UV on Mars-Express and then with the future NOMAD/UVIS on board of ExoMars 2016 TGO.

He will study dust (WP5) and clouds (WP4) in the Martian atmosphere.

Dr. Karolien Lefever  obtained her PhD in Mathematics (Astronomy) at the Institute for Astronomy of the K.U. Leuven in 2007. During her PhD, she obtained a lot of experience in the modelling of stellar atmospheres and in the exploitation of synthetic and observational data to retrieve information about stellar characteristics.
 
She joined the Copernicus Atmosphere team at IASB in March 2008. As stratospheric ozone expert, she was responsible for the validation of stratospheric constituents delivered by earth atmosphere models in the subsequent FP6 and FP7 projects GEMS, MACC and MACC-II. Since 2008, she is Redactor of Heelal, the Flemish monthly bulletin of the “Vereniging voor Sterrenkunde, Meteorologie, Geofysica en Aanverwante wetenschappen” (VVS). She has also been working as a freelancer for an educational institution for adults for the theme “science” since 2009, giving courses on astronomy, aeronomy, and climate. Throughout the years, she gained a lot of experience in popularizing science and in talking for a general public. Since March 2014, she is leading the Communication Cell at IASB.

She will be contributing to WP10 (Public Communication and Outreach), assuring the dissemination of project results to the general public.