Space provides to citizens and governments many services used in daily life, such as increasingly accurate global navigation services (e.g., the Galileo system), seamless and high data-rate telecommunication links through High Throughput Satellite (HTS) networks, extended Earth Observation (EO) for security surveillance, emergency management, and climate change monitoring (e.g., next-generation MetOp-SG and Copernicus Expansion programmes).
To continue supporting Europe’s capacity to conceive, develop, and operate state-of-the-art Space systems, EU research  programmes aim at  promoting the development of cutting-edge technologies for the upstream and downstream Space segments. Within these programmes and through coordination and collaboration with the key National and European stakeholders, CNR-IEIIT is engaged in both low-TRL research activities and application-driven activities (mainly for SatCom, EO and Space Science applications).
To foster the National and European competiveness in Space technologies, CNR-IEIIT has also started promoting internal initiatives on low-TRL technologies that could lead to an effective breakthrough in Space applications. The technologies currently identified according to the European Space technology roadmaps include

• Advance manufacturing of sub-Terahertz components (reference Oscar A. Peverini)

• Testing of large antennas through unmanned  aerial vehicles (reference G. Virone)

• Satellite quantum-key distribution technologies (reference M. Ferrari)