Ignacio Aguilar Sánchez

Ignacio Aguilar Sánchez – Area Director, SLS

Ignacio Aguilar Sánchez is the Area Director of the CCSDS Space Link Services Area (SLS).

Ignacio Aguilar Sanchez is a Senior Space Communications Systems Engineer at the European Space Agency (ESA)/ European space research and technology centre (ESTEC).

He holds an MSc in Telecommunications Engineering (1986, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain) and a Master’s in Business Administration (1997, Open University, United Kingdom).

Joined ESA in March 1991. Throughout his professional career at ESA he has been involved in a number of relevant projects and activities. In particular:

• Almost two decades of work for the SEA Security Working Group and in particular its application to Space Link Protocols in the last decade as member of the joint SLS-SEA Space Data Link Security Working Group, with frequent interaction with Space Link Protocols WG as well as with the Coding & Synchronization WG and the RF & Modulation WG;
• Rapporteur for the European Standards Telecommunication Institute (ETSI) for the revision of the ETSI Telemetry, Command and Ranging (TCR) Standard for Telecommunication Satellites (radio frequency modulation, coding) and accompanying technical report;
• GALILEO first generation, in charge of supervising the analysis and definition of their S-band and C-band space-to-ground interfaces, ranging from physical to application layers;
• Atomic Clock Ensemble in Space (ACES) Microwave Link (ML), a state-of-the-art two-way time-transfer system, supervising its design and development phase;
• Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), the ESA ISS Visiting Vehicle, in charge of its space communications systems during the design and development phase;
• Research and development activities covering robust spread spectrum communication (cryptographic modulation and synchronization), complementary channel coding and interleaving, frame synchronization as well as next generation telemetry systems and advanced antenna technology for launchers;
• Member and reviewer of the Technical Programme Committees of a number of conferences and workshops like the IEEE Military Communications Conference, IEEE Aerospace Conference, the ESA International Telemetry, Tracking and Command Workshop, the Space Ops Workshop as well as reviews for journals;
• Author of many publications addressing TT&C systems, spread spectrum modulation, channel coding and security.