Large Space Simulator gets a digital twin

Written by Copernical Team Monday, 06 October 2025 13:13

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The cavernous chamber of the Large Space Simulator

The Large Space Simulator, Europe’s largest vacuum chamber, routinely reproduces space conditions on Earth to test spacecraft before they fly into orbit. The facility is complex, and the current process of training a new operator is lengthy and complicated. To make it easier, the space simulator now has a digital twin – the most realistic virtual model of the facility yet, developed for the European Space Agency (ESA) by the Spanish engineering company Empresarios Agrupados.

About the Large Space Simulator

The Large Space Simulator (LSS), located at ESA’s Test Centre in the Netherlands, is Europe’s largest vacuum chamber. It is used for the testing of spacecraft in a space-like environment, including vacuum and extreme temperatures, before they fly into orbit.

A spacecraft under test is installed on a large robotic arm in the centre of the chamber and can be rotated with respect to a blinding beam of light produced by a set of 19 lamps, each the size of a grapefruit. This setup mimics how, when in space, the Sun-facing side of a spacecraft will heat up, while the shaded side will remain freezing cold

Exactly 50 years ago, the predecessor of the LSS – the Dynamic Test Chamber – was completed. Since then, the facility has evolved into the 15 m-high and 10 m-wide chamber we know today.

Over the past half-century, engineers have subjected countless spacecraft to the harsh conditions of space in the LSS, including the most recent EarthCARE, Smile, or the test version of Plato.