Purpose of the flight and payload description
BEXUS which stands for Balloon Experiments for University Students is a project part of the REXUS/BEXUs initiative that allows students from universities and higher education colleges across Europe and more recently also Canada to carry out scientific and technological experiments on stratospheric research balloons. The basic idea behind BEXUS is to provide an experimental space platform for students in different areas of interest such as atmospheric research, fluid physics, magnetic field, materials science, radiations physics, astrophysics, biology and also to serve as a platform for new technology demonstrations.
Each year, two balloons are launched from the European Space Range (ESRANGE) base near Kiruna, Sweden each carrying several experiments assembled on a medium-sized gondola (1.16 m x 1.16 m x 0.84 m). The total lifted-mass is approximately 300kg on each flight. With each payload weighing between 30 and 112 kg that means that 4 student experiments can be accomodated per gondola.
The first five flights of the program were carried out under sponsorship of the Swedish Space Corporation that offered available space on yearly technological flights carried out at ESRANGE. Since 2008, BEXUS is realised under a bilateral Agency Agreement between the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and the Swedish National Space Agency (SNSA). The Swedish share of the payload is made available to students from other European countries through a collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA). EuroLaunch, a cooperation between ESRANGE and the Mobile Rocket Base (MORABA) of DLR, is the organism responsible for the campaign management and operations of the launch vehicles.
On each cycle of the initiative, experts from DLR, SSC, ZARM (Center of Applied Space Technology and Microgravity, University of Bremen) and ESA provide technical support to the student teams throughout the project. It begins with a Call for Proposals, followed by a condensed space project lifecycle, including typical design phases and reviews, culminating in the launch of the experiments and publication of the final reports.
Video footage of the launch
Details of the balloon flight
Balloon launched on: 10/17/2026 at 8:35 UTC
Launch site: European Space Range, Kiruna, Sweden
Balloon launched by: Swedish Space Corporation (SSC)
Balloon manufacturer/size/composition: Zero Pressure Balloon
End of flight (L for landing time, W for last contact, otherwise termination time): 10/17/2026
Balloon flight duration (F: time at float only, otherwise total flight time in d:days / h:hours or m:minutes - ): + 3 h
Landing site: In Finland
The BEXUS 38 mission carried the following experiments.
ALBEDO, developed by Nordhausen University of Applied Sciences, Germany, measures solar radiation at different altitudes during the balloon flight to determine the variation of incoming and reflected radiation and estimate the EarthÂ’s albedo. Optical sensors measure radiation in the visible and infrared ranges.
BLESS (BEXUS HaLow Evaluation in Stratospheric Systems), developed by Universidad Francisco de Vitoria, Spain, tests Wi-Fi HaLow, the IEEE 802.11ah wireless standard operating in the sub-GHz band, under stratospheric conditions. The experiment uses a Morse Micro MM6108 system-on-chip and an STM32 microcontroller to measure communication performance.
CLOUDS (Calcium carbonate Light Observation Under stratospheric Dynamics and Scattering), developed by Justus Liebig University of Giessen and the University of Applied Sciences of Central Hesse, Germany, studies the optical properties and light-scattering behaviour of calcium carbonate particles under stratospheric conditions.
COATHEAL, developed by the Polytechnic University of Bucharest, Romania, tests a self-healing polymer coating applied to an aluminium substrate. The coating contains microencapsulated healing agents that are released when cracks form. The samples are exposed to the mechanical and thermal conditions of the flight and examined after recovery to evaluate the healing response.
DOPAMINS (Detection Of Positron Annihilation Mission In Near Space), developed by the Technical University of Berlin, Germany, searches for and measures positron annihilation radiation during the balloon flight. The experiment investigates radiation produced by positron-electron annihilation in the near-space environment.
PHILEAS (Project for High altitude Identification of Lightweight Exogenic Airborne Specimens), developed by the Technical University of Munich and WARR, Germany, collects and analyses lightweight particles present at high altitude to investigate particles of possible exogenic origin.
External references
Images of the mission
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