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No Aerospace Engineering at Imperial?

Hello, apologies if this is in the wrong section of the forums. I was wondering if anyone could tell me about the Aeronautical course at Imperial. I want to learn about space crafts as well, but imperial only offers Aeronautics, unlike us universities like caltech which have aerospace programs, if anyone can shed light onto this for me, would be appreciated!
Thanks.

Reply 1

Helloworld_95

UK universities tend to have very little space content on their aeronautics/aerospace courses as we don't have much of a space industry (at least not in the sense where we need aerospace engineers, we generally use specialists in the space industry so EEE, systems, computer science). I think aerospace courses have to have some element of space content and aeronautics doesn't but don't quote me on that. If you're looking for UK unis with a reasonable amount of space content, look towards Southampton, Bristol and Surrey. Sheffield also has a decent amount of space content now but most of it's optional and not credited.

Also CalTech is ridiculously competitive and the home of JPL so it's not really comparable to anything we have here.

Reply 2

shebby_7

Thanks for the helpful info! Guess I'll be looking for the US now...

Reply 3

Doones

Imperial:

MEng Aerospace Materials
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/engineering/departments/materials/courses/undergraduate-beng-meng-courses/meng-courses-materials-science-and-engineering/meng-aerospace-materials/

Also, MEng Aeronautical Engineering does include Aerospace-specific modules
e.g. Aerospace Vehicle Design in Y3

Oh and just be aware non-US citizens will struggle to get a job at NASA if that is your goal.
http://nasajobs.nasa.gov/jobs/noncitizens.htm

Lastly, have you considered Cambridge:
http://www3.eng.cam.ac.uk/admissions/course/aero/

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 4

Helloworld_95

Original post by shebby_7

Thanks for the helpful info! Guess I'll be looking for the US now...

Original post by jneill

Oh and just be aware non-US citizens will struggle to get a job at NASA if that is your goal.
http://nasajobs.nasa.gov/jobs/noncitizens.htm

Or any space or defence related jobs for that matter, whereas in the UK you can get into those kind of jobs as long as your country of origin is not considered a defence risk. If you're looking for the best job prospects as a non-US citizen your best bet is at a British or French University, potentially doing a masters at ISU in Strasbourg afterwards (and this costs some serious euro hence why you don't study in the US :tongue:

). If you're for India or China then your best bets would be in your home country. Also bare in mind it takes a long time to become a US citizen if you wish to go that route and time that you're enrolled in education doesn't count towards the requirement.

Reply 5

looseseal

Southampton has an Astronautics course which is pretty space-heavy. Also as a Postgrad (either MEng or PhD) Cranfield is a really good university for studying space-related topics. They have pretty good links with industry too.

Reply 6

shebby_7

Thanks all for the helpful feedback! I'm Pakistani here, so lol yea.......not gonna let that stop my love for jets and spacecraft!

Reply 7

Digital97

I'll just add that Surrey has a big space tech scene, the head of NASA was there a few months ago praising the work that they do. They spawned Surrey Satellite Technology, a now quite successful satellite business. I believe they are also the only UK university to have a commercial program that designs and builds satellites that actually go into orbit. The space centre at the university is pretty cool, they have a control room, clean room, an environment chamber - all the fun stuff.