I recently visited the University of Leicester’s Space Research Centre to learn more about its cutting-edge work and how this links to the development of Leicester’s new Space Park.

The Centre has three main areas of focus: developing novel sensors and optics for planetary landers and orbiters; providing engineering capability in space; and planetary science including next generation instruments, tools and techniques to analyse planetary materials.

It was great to be shown one of the Centre’s clean rooms, where I saw samples of Martian and lunar rock and a ‘double walled isolator’ used to prevent the contamination of samples. This was also used for the DNA analysis of Richard III’s remains in 2012!

You can read more about the Space Research Centre here, and Leicester’s new Space Park here.