“I studied at the University of Toulouse in France. This is a city with amazing spatial culture so I couldn’t but get very interested in space since a young age”, starts Dr. Bourdarie. “My special interests were in particle physics, modeling and mathematical physics”, he continues.

Dr. Bourdarie has been working on modeling the radiation belts physics for two decades now at the French National Aerospace Research Center ONERA, the most important center of research activities in space, aeronautics and defense in France. He has acquired great experience in processing and interpreting data from particle detectors onboard different satellites and has developed a space radiation database from various monitors. “The exploration of other planets of our solar system and their magnetospheres is a major challenge in my view. Take as an example Saturn and Uranus. In particular, the magnetic field of the latter is very different from that of Jupiter, roughly oriented by 60o in respect to the planet’s rotation axis”, says Dr. Bourdarie. “Another major challenge in space science is to manage to predict space weather accurately and with timeliness”, he adds.
The Van Allen Probes (formerly known as the Radiation Belt Storm Probes) is a NASA mission to understand the sun’s influence on Earth and near-Earth space by studying the Earth’s radiation belts on various scales of space and time. “The Van Allen Probes mission will allow doing very exciting science for the next few years and is expected to provide new insights to many unanswered questions”, says Dr. Bourdarie. For instance, they will help us understand how different solar events affect the radiation belts, how energetic particles from the solar wind and the Earth’s upper atmosphere enter the radiation belts and how they are accelerated. The two spacecraft have eccentric orbits that cover the entire radiation belt region and are currently providing lots of data on the inner Earth magnetosphere.

Besides theory Dr. Bourdarie is also involved with applied science and he is closely collaborating with the space industry: “I am interested in creating models of the Earth’s radiation belts which can serve in the building of safe satellites in terms of maximum dose of radiation that they can sustain, as well as, their resistance when singular events or discharge occur”, he explains.
The interaction and inter-relations between science and industry are not always straight-forward. “Scientists are somewhat nervous when realizing that the expectations of industry are very high and that a lot of money is involved. Industry is often asking scientists for great precision because they do not want to discourage their clients or lose large sums of money when building satellites”, says Dr. Bourdarie. However, scientists are always introducing in their models some uncertainty factor, which is quite inappropriate for the space industry. “This sometimes is frightening and takes us aback.., so we almost don’t dare to go ahead with our modeling out of fear of failing”, he says. On the other hand, working for industry can be very challenging and it can become a great motivation and a source of pride to see one’s work used for commercial purposes. “Industry is definitely a very different world compared to our science community. But these two "worlds" have to communicate together to make benefit of any progress made”, concludes Dr. Bourdarie.

Regarding his future research plans, Dr. Bourdarie says: “My ambition is to further help with the development of new specification models for the safe building of satellites. Hopefully my modeling will also help to develop space weather forecasting as good as meteorology is achieving now days (with a shift of almost 100 years…)”.
However, there are many challenges to overcome. “It becomes more and more difficult to get funding and this affects us greatly when trying to do our best science and to advance things significantly”, he says. Things are particularly tough for young people, as it becomes increasingly difficult to get an established career in the field of space science. There are not many positions around and one needs to be very good to manage to survive in the field. “Being good is not enough, you need to convince people to trust you and to prove that your abilities are complementary to their expectations”, says Dr. Bourdarie.
Science is not the unique occupation of Dr. Bourdarie. “I have a small farm 200 km north of Toulouse that belonged to my grandparents. It is a walnut grove of 7 hectares. I still operate it today myself”, he says. His other passions are do-it-yourself, hiking and cycling. I asked Dr. Bourdarie to share with us his life wisdom: “You need not brag about what you’ve accomplished or think that you are better than others. Be passionate, but stay humble”.

Eleni Chatzichristou

MAARBLE Outreach Team