Space Café Israel by Meidad Pariente

This Space Café Israel will feature Dr. Reut Sorek Abramovich - Astrobiologist, Professional speaker, Educator, Explorer, Analog Astronaut - in conversation with Meidad Pariente, correspondent of SpaceWatch.Global for Israel.

Biotech and health issues for future space missions - who is up for the challenge?

Dr. Reut Sorek Abramovich is an astrobiologist at the Dead Sea and Arava Science Centre, under the auspices of Ben Gurion University of the Negev. Her research topics include the beginning of life on Earth, extremophiles evolution and adaptation, Covid-19 viral evolution, using bacteria and algae for life support systems in space, and forward and backward contamination in human exploration missions. She is also the space sciences department Co-chair for the prestigious International Space University, 2023 Space Studies Program in Brazil. She does quite a bit of science, education and outreach activities, in Israel and abroad.

She started her professional career out of unit 8200 in IDF, then worked for several years in cyber software at Check Point Software Technologies. She then decided to turn to biology, genetics and ecology, to better understand the universe around her, and find extraterrestrial life one day. She received her PhD in 2013 in Microbiology and Immunology from the School of Biotechnology & Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Australia.

In Israel, she had the pleasure of being a Co-founder of space related NGOs : D-MARS (Desert Mars Analog Ramon Station) and the Israeli Mars Society. I participated as a Science officer analog astronaut in D-MARS01 - a Mars simulation mission in the Ramon crater, Israel. Later, at Amadee-2020, she conducted an experiment with the 6 person analog astronaut team of the Austrian Space Forum to continue and look for cross contamination challenges in human exploration.

She taught and managed for several years the Young Astronaut Academy program at the Davidson Institute of Science Education, (in Weizmann Institute of Science) and later in the Negev. The program reached TV and media outlets such as: National Geographic Kids Magazine, and the global STEAM arena. Teams of junior high and high school students had to understand space sciences, and work as astronauts in their own space simulation mission in the desert. Her current educational project is called ME-FIRST, and it aspires to bring a team of women from the Middle East region and train them as astronauts - leading indeed to a new leadership network of people in the Middle East, a real life space experience (aka launch), but most importantly - they return as leaders to their home communities. This project is in collaboration with Vered Cohen Barzilay and the Out of the Box organization. She hopes to join this team and experience space too, hopefully, not alone and not just once.

Meidad Pariente is an entrepreneur and innovator, with more than 25 years of experience in managing technologies. He is the CTO and Co-founder of SPACECIALIST, and CIO and Co-Founder of SKY AND SPACE Company (Nanosatellite Communication Network company). Before he was the CTO and Co-founder of Effective Space Solutions (Now Astroscale IL). Meidad advised space insurance companies, and led several multidisciplinary programs for ImageSat International, Elbit space division, The Technion and Rafael. He was the technical lead and AIT manager for “Duchifat-1”, the first Israeli nanosatellite. In the past he worked at MBT-Space as a satellite operator, systems engineer, Chief systems engineer, and Chief architect for several communication and earth observation satellites. During his carrier at Israel Aerospace Industries, Meidad won seven “business improvement awards” and two “outstanding performance” awards. Meidad is also an experienced director and board member.

The audience will have an opportunity to ask questions in dialogue with Reut Sorek Abramovich.

This Space Café Israel will be conducted in English.

SpaceWatch.Global is a Europe-based digital magazine and portal for those interested in space and the far-reaching impact of the space sector.

Reut Sorek Abramovich