UK and Taiwan to forge space partnership, with universities teaming up to give students real-world mission experience

The collaborative plans follow multiple successful engagements between the Universities, from NCU professor Loren Chang joining a Taiwanese delegation to Guildford in March to partnership working between students from each university earlier this summer when Surrey and NCU worked with launch provider Stellar Kinetics at Etlaq Spaceport in Oman. The students worked together to integrate the Jovian-O and SIGHT space payloads that they had developed onto the KEA-1 rocket. 

The universities also share research interests. The Surrey Space Centre has built space-based radiation detectors and, as part of the UK’s SWIMMR programme to improve resilience to space weather, developed miniature detectors to measure radiation at different altitudes and created a model for the UK Met Office to predict radiation levels experienced by aircraft. 

NCU has developed multiple scientific payloads and small satellite science missions, including the Deep Space Radiation Probe (DSRP), which flew aboard the commercial lunar payload service provider, ispace, Inc.’s Resilience lunar lander, launched in January 2025. DSRP was operational for more than 97% of the five-month mission, providing measurements of the radiation belts, several solar radiation storms and radiation in lunar orbit. It was the first Taiwanese payload to fly and operate beyond Low Earth Orbit. 

Established in Taiwan in 1962, the NCU has extensive experience in space science and engineering, with a strong mandate on space science and the geosciences. NCU is also Taiwan’s only university with a Department of Space Science and Engineering with undergraduate and graduate programmes. It is also home to Taiwan’s first interdisciplinary university space centre, the Centre for Astronautical Physics and Engineering (CAPE). NCU currently has robust research and education programs on space weather, satellite communications, small satellite missions, and the space environment. 

Surrey has a 45-year legacy of space leadership, particularly through the Surrey Space Centre and its renowned expertise in small satellite technology. This legacy has transformed the economics of space and led to the success of major spinouts, including Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL). The new Surrey Space Institute aims to align the University’s space-related activities across disciplines to address emerging challenges and seize global opportunities in the expanding space economy. 

With Taiwan’s rapidly growing Space sector and the Taiwan Space Agency’s ambitious target of growing their space economy to 1 trillion NTD by 2029, the NCU and Surrey are working on ways to support this growth and address potential skills challenges through career professional development and degree programmes. 

The British Office in Taipei has supported the two organisations in reaching their memorandum of understanding through travel grants from the tactical fund. Further visits to each other’s universities will take place over the next few months to formalise detailed work plans.