Program and Speakers

Born on 2 September 1953 in Heidenheim, Germany. Studied Physics at University in München and Heidelberg, where he received his Ph.D. at the Institute for Environmental Physics in 1985. He performed post-doc research at Princeton University before joining the German astronaut corps in late 1987.

In 1996 Thiele moved to Houston, Texas, where he was trained as mission specialist by NASA. In February 2000 he participated in the STS-99 Shuttle Radar Topography Mission, which aimed at generating a 3D digital topographical map of Earth’s landmass.

In 2001 Thiele returned to the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, where he became head of the astronaut division in 2005. In 2009 Thiele was responsible for the last ESA astronaut selection. Since 2010 Thiele worked as resident fellow at the European Space Policy Institute in Vienna focusing in his research on Space Exploration and on European Autonomy in Space. In 2013 he became Head of the Strategic Planning and Outreach Office in the Directorate of Human Spaceflight and Operations at ESA.

Since 2016 Thiele is self-employed and has a lecturer assignment at the Rheinisch-Westfälische Hochschule (RWTH) in Aachen. Gerhard Thiele is married and has four children.

Professor Dr. Martin Fiebich studied physics at the Universität of Münster from 1982 to 1988. As a graduate physicist, he then worked at the Institute for Clinical Radiology at Münster University Hospital and was employed there as a medical physicist from 1988 to 2000. During this time, he completed supplementary studies in medicine and completed his doctorate in medicine in 1995. From 1996 to 1998, he worked in the Department of Radiology at the University of Chicago in the Kurt Rossmann Laboratories on research in computer-assisted diagnosis. In 2000, he received an appointment at the Technical University of Central Hesse in the field of imaging systems in medicine.

He has been a member of Working Committee AA6 "Imaging Techniques" of the German Stadardization Group in Radiology (NAR) since 2005 and is chairman of this committee since 2010.

In 2011, he was appointed to working committees of the German Commission on Radiological Protection, e.g., working committee A2 "Medicine" and A4 "Radiation Protection Technology" as well as the working group "Measurement Uncertainties" and he was head of the working group "Quality Assurance in Medicine" from 2017 to 2018.

From 2014 to 2020, he was chairman of the "Biomedical Imaging" division of the German Society for Medical Physics (DGMP) and is currently vice president of the DGMP since 2021.

Professor Fiebich's research focuses on dose optimization for patients and staff, the development of new methods in quality assurance, and dosimetry in X-ray diagnostics especially in computed tomography.

Mr. Kroupnik is the Executive Director of Space Exploitation at the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

Mr. Kroupnik holds a Master of Engineering/Aerospace degree from Concordia University (Montreal), and the PMP certification by the Project Management Institute.

He has more than 30 years of engineering, functional, program, and executive management experience in the aerospace domain. Mr. Kroupnik led R&D activities, development, and launch of small- and microsatellites in Earth Observation, Space Situational Awareness, and satellite communications domains, such as CASSIOPE, NEOSSat, and M3MSat, and contributed to major satellite programs like Anik – F2, Radarsat –1, and Radarsat-2. In close collaboration with other government departments, and industrial team, Mr. Kroupnik has been leading development, deployment, and operations of the Radarsat Constellation Mission (RCM) – the flagship project of the Canadian Space Program.

 Mr. Kroupnik is internationally recognized expert in satellite matters and has been invited to contribute to the activities of international bodies like Coordinating Committee on Meteorological Satellites (CGMS), Group on Earth Observation (GEO), and Expert Team on Satellite Matters (ET-SAT) of the World Meteorological Organization. He represents CSA on the Board of the International Charter on Space and Major Disasters.