CARIOQA-PHB
Cold Atom Rubidium Interferometer in Orbit for Quantum Accelerometry – Phase B
2025-2027
Funded by the European Union under Grant Agreement 101189541
Call HORIZON-CL4-2024-SPACE-01
CARIOQA-PHB was kicked off on October 15th, 2025, and will last 2 years.
The project is coordinated by CNES with the support of DLR. Its goal is to establish a preliminary definition of the concept chosen for the Quantum Space Gravimetry Pathfinder Mission called CARIOQA. The emergence of quantum sensors offers an opportunity to provide new applications for climate sciences through the improvement of space gravimetry performance. Hence, the mastery of this technology in space is one of the major environmental, technological, and strategic challenges of the decade.
As the second step of the CARIOQA programme, the main objectives of CARIOQA-PHB are:
- to establish the preliminary design and technical solutions answering to the project and system requirements of the Quantum Space Gravimetry Pathfinder Mission;
- to establish a maturation plan for critical technologies and components necessary to the deployment of the mission within the decade;
- to assess the readiness of the project and its maturity to enter into the following phases through a Preliminary Design Review concluding CARIOQA-PHB.
CARIOQA-PHB brings together the main players of quantum sensors in Europe. It gathers unique skills among 14 partners from 5 EU Member States including 2 space agencies, 5 research organizations and 5 industries.
Within the project, the task of the SATGEO team is to contribute to the instrument and mission performances assessment by numerical simulations and analysis of quantum observations in space for the purpose of gravity field retrieval.
Official project website: https://carioqa-quantumpathfinder.eu/
YouTube channel of the project: https://www.youtube.com/@CARIOQAMission
Linkedin page of the project: https://www.linkedin.com/company/carioqa-quantumpathfinder
