HELIA (ESA / BEXUS 39)
HELIA stands for High-altitude Exposure Laboratory for Incubation and Analysis. I am part of the University of Nottingham team developing this experiment for BEXUS 39, a stratospheric balloon flight within the REXUS/BEXUS programme. The programme is run by the German and Swedish space agencies, DLR and SNSA, in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA).
Our first experiment, HELIA MK1, is planned to fly from Esrange Space Center in northern Sweden in October 2026.
The experiment
We want to understand how human cells respond to radiation in the stratosphere, particularly ultraviolet light. At this altitude, low pressure and extreme cold can also affect the cells. HELIA is being built as an open-source incubator that keeps the samples at normal atmospheric pressure and regulates their temperature, so we can study the effects of radiation under controlled conditions.
The experiment is designed to carry six samples of U-87 MG human cells: three exposed to UV and three kept as controls. We will monitor their fluorescence during flight and preserve the samples automatically after exposure for analysis back in the laboratory. The wider aim is to develop a reusable platform that other teams can build on for future biological experiments.
My work
I work as Mission Analyst, contributing to the scientific mission and thermal studies. My interest is in connecting the physics of the flight environment with the science we can obtain from the payload, using the research literature to help assess the experiment and support reliable data.
More about HELIA
Solar explorer
This browser tool explores how low-angle sunlight could be redirected through the top window of the HELIA canister with an external mirror. It is a geometric study, with adjustable mirror position and angle, rather than a final optical model of the payload.