Activities

IAA Newly Elected Members received their certificates and IAA pins from IAA President John Schumacher, IAA Vice-President Scientific Activities Ralph McNutt, IAA Vice-President Awards & Membership Chrisoula Kourtidou-Papadeli, IAA Vice-President Publications & Communication Marius-Ioan Piso, and IAA Vice-President Finance Shigeki Kinai, on Monday 24 March, 2025 in Paris, France during the IAA Award Dinner ceremony. Photo: Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Antonios Kyparos (Greece), Aaron Rogers (USA), Jean-Michel Contant (France), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Chrysoula Kourtidou-Papadeli (Greece), John Schumacher (USA), Ingrid Detter de Frankopan (Sweden/Croatia), Ralph McNutt (USA), Philippe Da Silva Passos (France), Olivier Mousis (France), Reinhold Bertrand (Germany).

IAA Newly Elected Members received their certificates and IAA pins from IAA President John Schumacher, IAA Vice-President Scientific Activities Ralph McNutt, IAA Vice-President Awards & Membership Chrisoula Kourtidou-Papadeli, IAA Vice-President Publications & Communication Marius-Ioan Piso, and IAA Vice-President Finance Shigeki Kinai, on Sunday 13 October 2024 in Milan, Italy during the IAA Award Dinner ceremony. Photo: John Schumacher (USA), Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Yasuhiro Kawakatsu (Japan), Satomi Kawamoto (Japan), Marco Sabatini (Italy), Nicola Sparvieri (Italy), Chrysoula Kourtidou-Papadeli (Greece), Ralph McNutt (USA), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Jean-Michel Contant (France).

Many Academicians and international experts attended the Academy Day Busan held on Saturday July 13, 2024 on the occasion of the COSPAR Scientific Assembly. Organizers of this event were Ralph McNutt, Athena Coustenis and Rosaly Lopes. Welcome addresses were given by IAA Vice President Ralph McNutt, COSPAR President Pascale Ehrenfreund and Executive Director Jean-Claude Worms. The Scientific Program is available at EVENTS/IAA Academy DAYS/Acad. Day COSPAR

The IAA Board of Trustees held its 127th meeting in Paris, France on March 26, 2024 at the IAA Headquarters. Photo: Julie Payette (Canada), Jean-Michel Contant (France), John Schumacher (USA), Elena Fomina (Russia),  Chrysoula Kourtidou-Papadeli (Greece), Athena Coustenis (France), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Giovanni Palmerini (Italy), Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Lev Zelenyi (Russia), James Chilton (USA), Christopher Geiger (USA), Olivier Contant (France), Ralph McNutt (USA), Jan-Willem den Herder (Netherlands), Junichiro Kawaguchi (Japan).

The IAA Board of Trustees held a meeting in Baku, Azerbaijan on October 1st, 2023. Photo: Olivier Contant (France), John Schumacher (USA), Dumitru-Dorin Prunariu (Romania), Jean-Michel Contant (France), Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Elena Fomina (Russia), Julie Payette (Canada), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Chiaki Mukai (Japan), Ralph McNutt (USA), Athena Coustenis (France), Efim Malitikov (Russia), Lev Zelenyi (Russia), Leslie Tennen (USA).

IAA Newly Elected Corresponding Members and Full Members received their certificates on Sunday October 1st, 2023 in Baku, Azerbaijan during the IAA Award Dinner ceremony. The following IAA Academicians received their certificate and IAA pin on this occasion: Elchin Babayev (Azerbaijan, CM1), Vali Huseynov (Azerbaijan, CM1), Xue Yong (China, CM1), James Barrington-Brown (UK, CM2), Joon-Min Choi (South Korea, CM2), Michael Gross (USA, CM2), Wahyudi Hasbi (Indonesia, CM2), Jill Prince (USA, CM2), Kazuhito Shimada (Japan, CM3), Nasr Al-Sahhaf (Saudi Arabia, CM4), Veronica La Regina (Italy, CM4), Dhandapani Gowrisankar (India, CM4), Lori Walton (Canada, CM4), Zheng Riheng (China, CM4), David Bearden (USA, M2), Tatsuaki Hashimoto (Japan, M2), Gary Martin (USA, M2), Daniel Oltrogge (USA, M2), Noelia Sanchez Ortiz (Spain, M2), Koji Tanaka (Japan, M2), Zhu Zheng Hong George (Canada, M2), Zhou Guangming (China, M3), Olga Bannova (USA, M4), Bhavya Lal (USA, M4), Agnieszka Lukaszczyk (Poland, M4), Martha Mejia-Kaiser (Mexico, M4). Photo: Noelia Sanchez-Ortiz (Spain), Zhu Zheng-Hong (Canada), Daniel Oltrogge (USA), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania),  Tatsuaki Hashimoto (Japan), Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Jean-Michel Contant (France), John Schumacher (USA), Ralph McNutt (USA).

On the occasion of the Academy Day Baku held on October 1st, 2023, the IAA 2023 Laurels for Team Achievement Award was presented to the Chang'e-5 Mission Team. The 2023 Laurels for Team Achievements are given to the Chang’e-5 Team. During the 23-day mission, the Chang’e-5 team successfully completed a complex mission including rocket launching, lunar-earth transfer, lunar sampling, lunar surface takeoff, rendezvous and docking sample transfer, skip re-entry and other processes, and obtained two types of lunar samples of lunar surface sampling and drilling sampling, making outstanding contributions to human lunar and deep space exploration. Through the Chang’e-5 mission, we discovered a new lunar mineral Chang’e-stone, revealed the existence of magmatic activity on the Moon up to 2 billion years, and found a high content of solar wind-caused water. Photo: Chang'e-5 Mission Team.

On the occasion of the Academy Day Baku held on October 1st, 2023, the IAA 2023 Laurels for Team Achievement Award was presented to the Emirates Mars Mission Team. The 2023 Laurels for Team Achievement is presented to the international team of engineers, scientists, and managers who, through an extraordinary knowledge partnership, co-developed the Emirates Mars Mission, the first interplanetary mission by an Arab nation, in order to advance our understanding of the Martian atmosphere through synoptic images across all times of day. The Emirates Mars Mission was developed by an international team of 450 engineers, scientists, instrument specialists and project managers, with members from the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre in Dubai, UAE, the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at the University of Colorado Boulder, Arizona State University and the Space Sciences Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. This team of outstanding individuals drove the development and operation of the mission at a remarkable pace and with significant innovation. This unique combination of talents was managed as a single, integrated team to deliver an interplanetary mission with a revolutionary approach to mission design, management and execution. With its innovative elliptical orbit and three scientific instruments, the Emirates Mars Mission Hope probe is the first spacecraft at Mars able to make synoptic images across all times of day at visible, thermal infrared and far ultraviolet wavelengths. Photo: Emirates Mars Mission Team.

On the occasion of the Academy Day Baku held on October 1st, 2023, the IAA 2023 Laurels for Team Achievement Award was presented to the International Artemis 1 Mission Team. The 2023 Laurels for Team Achievement recognizing extraordinary performance and achievement by a team of scientists, engineers, technicians, and managers in the field of Astronautics, are given to the Artemis 1 Team. The highly successful international Artemis 1 flight test mission lasted for 25.5 days and traveled over 1.4 million miles on a journey from Earth to the Moon and beyond; and then a safe return to Earth. The Artemis 1 mission proved that NASA’s Space Launch System deep Space rocket, Orion spacecraft, and the ground systems needed for launch and recovery are ready to fly astronauts on missions to the Moon. The SLS rocket flew as designed and with precision; the Orion spacecraft and European Service Module successfully completed all test objectives during a journey of nearly 270,000 miles beyond the Moon and farther than any spacecraft built for humans has flown. The Artemis program is intended to be the broadest and most diverse international human space exploration coalition in history. Photo: John Schumacher (USA), Jean-Michel Contant (France), Elena Fomina (Russia), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Ralph McNutt (USA) and Amit Kshatriya (USA).

The IAA Board of Trustees held its 125th meeting in Paris, France on March 28, 2023 at the IAA Headquarters. Photo: Athena Coustenis (France), Elena Fomina (Russia), John Schumacher (USA), Chrysoula Kourtidou-Papadeli (Greece), Ralph McNutt (USA), Jean-Michel Contant (France), Marius-Ioan Piso (Romania), Shigeki Kinai (Japan), Olivier Contant (France), Miguel Bello-Mora (Spain), Lev Zelenyi (Russia) and Junichiro Kawaguchi (Japan).