The intensification of extreme weather events, coastal erosion and sea-level rise are major challenges to be urgently addressed by European coastal cities. The science behind these disruptive phenomena is complex, and advancing climate resilience requires progress in data acquisition, forecasting, and understanding of the potential risks and impacts for real-scenario interventions. The Ecosystem-Based Approach (EBA) supported by smart technologies has potential to increase climate resilience of European coastal cities; however, it is not yet adequately understood and coordinated at European level. SCORE outlines a co-creation strategy, developed via a network of 10 coastal city ‘living labs’ (CCLLs), to rapidly, equitably and sustainably enhance coastal city climate resilience through EBAs and sophisticated digital technologies. SCORE will establish an integrated coastal zone management framework for strengthening EBA and smart coastal city policies, creating European leadership in coastal city climate change adaptation in line with The Paris Agreement. The Coastal City Living Lab (CCLL) is a new concept that expands the Living Lab approach to coastal cities and settlements. CCLLs will be set up to address specific climate challenges, and their effectiveness will be assessed by different stakeholders through innovative monitoring systems and cutting-edge modelling approaches. SCORE will develop CCLLs in a network of 10 cities which learn from each other in different frontrunner and follower roles. SCORE will involve citizen science in providing prototype coastal city early-warning systems and will enable smart, instant monitoring and control of climate resilience in European coastal cities through open, accessible spatial ‘digital twin’ tools. SCORE will provide innovative platforms to empower stakeholders’ deployment of EBAs to increase climate resilience, business opportunities and financial sustainability of coastal cities.

The QV-LIFT project aims at building the foundation of the Ground Segment Technology for the future Q/V band Terabit SatCom systems. This ambitious task will be undertaken developing core hardware and software technologies addressing urgent physical to network level needs. QV-LIFT intends to demonstrate a TRL6 for all the technologies developed and, significantly, integrating them in a realistic scenario enabled by access to the Q/V band Aldo Paraboni payload, on board of AlphaSat, and by the relevant Ground Segment made available by the Italian Space Agency. QV-LIFT is committed to increase the maturity level of key satellite communication technologies and to contribute to a more competitive positioning of SatCom European manufacturers in the marketplace in many ways. 1)QV-LIFT intends to advance the European RF SatCom technology by developing the following building blocks and systems at Q/V band: i)GaN power amplifier MMICs at V band with up to 5W RF power output ii)a V band power combining High Power Amplifier based on GaN technology targeting up to 15 W power output; iii)a high performance Block Up Converter operating in the V band; iv)a Low Noise Block down converter operating in the Q band; v)Q/V band, Tx/Rx, single aperture antennas for the mobile and fixed terminals; vi)a Q/V band TX/RX single aperture terminal suitable for airborne applications; 2)QV-LIFT intends to develop the first Q/V band Smart Gateways Management System able to counteract the propagation impairments removing one the main obstacle to the deployment of the future Q/V band Ground Segment. 3)QV-LIFT fosters links between academia, large companies and SMES. In doing so, QV-LIFT targets the full and stable integration of SMEs into the SatCom value chain by developing know how in the following key areas which are recognized as strategic for the future SatCom market: -MMIC GaN integrated circuits, -Q/V band RF components, -Ground Segment Infrastructures.

Major developments in small satellite technologies coupled with the rapid commercialisation of New Space are disrupting the space landscape. A driving role rests with the telecommunication vertical, where market demands for global connectivity led to the emergence of LEO and MEO mega-constellation and are accelerating efforts for the integration of non-terrestrial with terrestrial networks. Core to this vision is an architectural paradigm shift from large monolithic satellites to an orchestrated network of multi-orbit spaceborne nodes of various sizes and capabilities. On the other hand, space missions traditionally dominated by governmental initiatives - such as Navigation (GNSS) and Earth observation (EO) - are slower in adopting the New Space spirit towards coordination and synergetic exploitation of emerging and established satellite systems. Yet these systems have had transformative impact on our daily lives along a plethora of applications and verticals. Anticipating the next New Space frontiers in commercially driven missions within these domains, a central view of HARMONY is that step change potential will be released by adopting distributed satellite architectures across a range of existing and new applications where the space environment provides unique benefits. Placing innovative space services at its core, HARMONY will adopt a cross-disciplinary & vertically integrated approach in the study of federated and fractionated satellite system architectures and the development of core underpinning technologies in a doctoral network that will nurture future European New Space leaders.