UK Space Facilities University College London, Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL)

University College London, Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL)

UCL was one of the first universities in the world to become involved in making scientific observations in space. Since MSSL was established at Holmbury St Mary in 1966, the laboratory has participated in more than 35 satellite missions and over 200 rocket experiments. MSSL has a wide range of facilities on site to support the technology programme within MSSL; these facilities are also available for use by other university groups and commercial companies, either as part of a research collaboration or via a contractual arrangement. The facilities are generally designed to cater for small to medium-sized instruments and to meet ESA, NASA or other space agencies’ standards and requirements. In addition to test facilities, MSSL also has cleanrooms providing environmentally controlled areas for space flight hardware assembly, integration and test.

MSSL's facilities are mainly used for internal purposes, but there is some spare capacity to support external customers under usual commercial arrangements.

Facilities

MSSL Clean Rooms
MSSL has three clean rooms for assembly, integration and test of flight instrumentation.
MSSL Thermal Vacuum Chamber
MSSL Vibration Facility
MSSL has a Ling Dynamics V726 vibration facility for flight hardware qualification and acceptance testing, installed in an ISO Class 8 clean room.