ICUFN 2022 Conference Dates: July 5(Tue.) ~ July 8(Fri.), 2022
Venue: Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (UPC-BarcelonaTech), Vertex Building
Location: https://goo.gl/maps/V5ir4c8BKW2DTRQ37
Address:
Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (UPC-BarcelonaTech), Vertex Building, Plaça d’Eusebi Güell, 6, 08034 Barcelona, Spain
With the goal of being as close as possible to the students, faculty, and research community, the Symposium will take place in the Barcelona’s biggest University and research campus. With more than a dozen of schools from both the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and the Universitat de Barcelona, and a cluster of first-class research institutions such as the Institut d’Estudis Espacials de Catalunya, the Diagonal Campus and its facilities are the natural environment to hold such an event related to Space Education.
Specifically, the Symposium will be held at the Vèrtex Building belonging to the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. Having an Auditorium with a full capacity of nearly 500 seated people, an auxiliary Event Room with almost 200 seats, and multiple rooms to hold meetings and locate stands, it is equipped with the most modern technological appliances allowing the delivery of high-quality multimedia presentations to an audience of hundreds.
The Diagonal Campus is very well connected by two underground lines to Barcelona’s city centre (20 min) and to Barcelona’s airport (40 min). Extensive bus lines and tramway also operate in the campus area.
Vèrtex’s auxiliary Event Room will host the Symposium’s parallel presentation sessions, with the aim of accommodating the maximum number of presentations possible during the Symposium. It will be available for use as well during the whole duration of the Symposium.
It has a capacity of 160 seated people, and has the equipment required to deliver multimedia presentations.
Vèrtex is equipped with 8 additional rooms, having a combined capacity of 220 people. At least one room will be reserved and devoted for the organising committee to work and hold any necessary meetings, and a room will be used as well for the European Space Agency’s Education Office.
The rest of the rooms will be conditioned to host stands from academic institutions, research institutes, industry players, as well as attendees’ posters. Every day, there will be an official allotted time for attendees to visit stands.
Inside the Vèrtex Building, the common area right after the entrance and next to the Auditorium doors will be used for event registration and management purposes. It will host the Symposium’s organisation desk, and it will also be used to install the stands of the main organisers of the event, such as the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya or ESA Education Office, as well as sponsors.
Vèrtex Building has an outside garden, accessible from the interior, which will be used to serve drinks and pastries during coffee breaks, as well as for the food service during lunch time. The garden will be open for use during the whole Symposium for attendees to go outside and relax or get some fresh air.
In the unlikely event, given the Spring weather records in Barcelona, of a rainy day, the food service will be served indoors in the common entrance area, also suited to accommodate such needs.
The Vèrtex Building has different points of interest nearby, which might be appealing for those participants willing to wander around or walk a bit during the allotted free time or during lunch breaks. Notably, just by 5 min walking from the Venue, there are the Pedralbes Gardens, a former King’s palace that currently hosts the general secretariat of the Union for the Mediterranean.
The palace dates back from an old country house of the 17th century and was completely reformed in 1862. Formerly property of the Güell’s family, it counts with the so-called Güell’s pavilions, designed by the genius and renowned architect Antoni Gaudí, who also designed the layout of the gardens, where one can still find some fountains and benches designed by himself. Its quiet and calm atmosphere in the middle of one of the busiest streets of Barcelona, the Diagonal Avenue, offers a unique space where participants will be able to experience the charms of Barcelona and the Catalan modernist architecture.
The Vèrtex Building is also just a 5-minute walk away from one of the major scientific centres in Barcelona, the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre (BSC-CNS). This research centre hosts the MareNostrum 4, one of the most interesting supercomputers in the world with a total speed of up to 13.7 petaflops. It is the most powerful supercomputer in Spain, part of the thirteen supercomputers in the Spanish Supercomputing Network, and one of the seven supercomputers of the European Infrastructure PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe).