S5Lab

We’re extremely happy to report that last week our lab was represented by two of our PhD students, Alessia Di Giacomo and Tommaso Pantalani, at the 27th ESA PAC Symposium for Balloon and Rocket Programmes in Trondheim, Norway. 🇳🇴

During the symposium, they had the opportunity to present both the RETINA and VIPER missions, which flew respectively in 2024 and 2026, sharing the work, challenges, results, and lessons learned from both projects with the wider European student space community. 🎈🚀

It was a truly inspiring experience to listen to other student teams, engineers, researchers, institutions, and companies working in the field of balloon, rocket, and space research. The symposium was not only a chance to present our missions, but also to exchange ideas, learn from others, and see the incredible variety of projects developed across Europe. 🌍✨

We would like to sincerely thank the Programme, , , , ZARM, , , and all sponsors and mentors for making this opportunity possible. 🙏

A special thank you also goes to the team at Andøya Space for organizing the symposium and to the many people that attended and listened to our talks. 💬

RETINA StudentResearch SpaceEngineering RocketScience BalloonMission Trondheim AerospaceEngineering SpaceResearch

We went GO for DEPLOYMENT! 🛰️

Our 2U CubeSat CORAL, developed together with and under a research project has been deployed from the this morning at 08.45 UTC. 🌍

We successfully contacted the satellite shortly after deployment, throughout the first passes over the ground station in Rome. 📡

CORAL is the sixth S5Lab CubeSat to be successfully operated in space. Our research group becomes one of the very few in the world to be controlling 3 CubeSats from different launches and with different missions at the same time, while CORAL joins WildTrackCube-SIMBA and LEDSAT in LEO.

We were happy to participate and cheer in the deployment event today and honoured to have a cheerful comment from Prof. Marco Casolino from celebrating our satellite deployment and the industry-academia partnership that successfully brought to orbit an all Italian satellite.

CORAL will continue its early operations throughout the next few days for later starting its payloads mission.

Photo and Video Credit: JAXA

⚠️ CORAL is GO for DEPLOYMENT! 🛰️

Our satellite CORAL, developed with the Center for Aerospace Studied (CRAS) in collaboration with and under an research action, will deployed from the next Tuesday, 3 February 2026, around 08.50 UTC (09.50 CET). 🛰️

The spacecraft deployment will be covered by a YouTube event hosted by , which will feature us as guests and the Embassy of Italy in Tokyo as guests at Tsukuba Space Centre. 📡

You’re invited to join the live feed from JAXA to give the final Go/No go call to CORAL with us 🚥!

Please join at https://www.youtube.com/live/aB4PIOS-hSs on Tuesday 3 February at 08.10CET!

More updates on the CORAL initial operations will follow.