Estonian National Graduate Trainee in Robotics

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Job Requisition

Date Posted: 15 September 2026

Closing Date: 13 October 2026 23:59 CET/CEST

Publication:
External Only

Type of Appointment ( learn more) :
National Graduate Trainee

Directorate:
Human and Robotic Exploration

The ESA National Graduate Trainee (NGT) Programmes offer recent Master’s graduates the opportunity to gain practical, hands‑on experience at ESA across a range of space‑related disciplines. The programmes are essentially similar to ESA’s own Graduate Trainee Programme, notably in offering the same employment conditions. They however differ in one important respect: each NGT Programme is funded by an individual ESA Member State or Associate Member under a bilateral partnership agreement concluded with ESA.
As a result, a representative of the sponsoring State participates in the selection process. In addition to assessing candidates against the requirements of the position, the selection may also include an evaluation of their background and knowledge of the space policies and related activities of the sponsoring State.

Location

The Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration is the main ESA entity in charge of supporting and coordinating efforts towards the current and the future endeavours of human spaceflight. The exploration activities are part of the strategic plans in securing a central role for Europe with respect to the global initiatives. The strategy includes three destinations where humans will work with robots to gather new knowledge:
Low Earth Orbit (LEO), the Moon, and Mars.

The “Spaceship ECSAT” initiative is investigating low Technology Readiness Level (TRL) technologies for supporting the future cislunar space mission as well as surface activities on the Moon as part of the Exploration Preparation, Research and Technology (ExPeRT) team. This multidisciplinary, innovation‑driven team composed by researchers, graduate and undergraduate students is based at the ESA European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications (ECSAT).

The founding idea behind this initiative is to prepare the future of Space exploration. To do so, a pragmatic and research focused approach is adopted, and knowledge acquired is disseminated within ESA, partners and the relevant scientific community.

The Spaceship team is also involved in supporting the development of our VULCAN facility s facility is designed to be a focal point for simulant development (including regolith, rocks etc.) and curation activities in Europe for Space Applications, with a focus on Exploration and Science. It provides expertise to ESA, its member states, and potentially worldwide regarding analogue and simulant materials.

We are continually looking for innovative applicants with skills or interests in these areas to join the Spaceship ECSAT team.

Within Spaceship ECSAT, we have a number of fields where we carry out different projects. Our team is always on the lookout for talented and motivated persons to join our projects and contribute to ESA’s exploration activities. The main areas into which the initiative is currently active are remote manipulation, surface mobility, embedded systems and human‑machine interfaces.

Some of the topics you may be working on as a National Graduate Trainee are the following:

• demonstrating disruptive technologies such as Virtual/Augmented Reality, collaborative robotics and their potential use cases for exploration;
• investigating novel concepts in the domain of Space Resources/In‑Situ Resource Utilisation, to enable sustainable human exploration;
• topics related to ‘off world living’, e.g. human factors, design and…