Ensemble, in partnership with Freelancer, is thrilled to announce the winners of NASA’s “ Detect, Track, and Remediate: The Challenge of Small Space Debris ,” a global competition aimed at addressing the critical issue of small debris in Earth’s low-earth orbit (LEO) environment.

Participants were challenged to propose scalable solutions for detecting, characterizing, tracking, and remediating debris ranging from 1mm to 10cm, aiming to enhance space safety and sustainability.

Contestants submitted concept papers in one of the three prize categories (Detect & Characterize; Track; and Remediate) and competed for a share of the $120,000 prize purse.

Detect and Characterize Winners:

1st Place, Daniel Gebhardt ( @dangebhardt )

2nd Place, Christine Hartzell ( @gtg733w )

3rd Place, Jesse Reynolds ( @jreyn1 )

4th Place, Richárd Ádám Vécsey ( @richardvecsey )

5th Place, Nevin Thinagar ( @nevinthinagar )

Tracking Winners:

1st Place, Christophe Choquet ( @ENERC )

1st Place, Paolo Petrinca ( @paolopetrinca )

Remediation Winners:

1st Place, Dmitri Garin ( @sweetjade00 )

2nd Place, Josep Rueda ( @pep248 )

3rd Place, Jeffrey Morse ( @jbmorse )

4th Place, Kyran McDonnell ( @revoltenergy )

Congratulations again to all of the winners for their innovative concepts. Read more about the winning submissions here: Press Release

Jan 04, 2024

Update on the awards

Dear participants,

Thank you for your patience as we were selecting the winners of the Detect, Track, and Remediate Challenge! We hope you had a great holiday break and enjoyed the time with your loved ones.

We are currently finalizing the results of the judging and preparing for the awards. We anticipate to notify the participants about the decision by the end of this week and commencing the awarding process early next week.

Thank you! Have a great rest of your week.

Dec 13, 2023

Winner Notification Update

Dear participants,

We are currently finishing the judging process and are in the final stages of selecting the winners.

Unfortunately, the announcement, originally scheduled for Wednesday, December 13, will be postponed. The winners will be announced early January the latest.

Stay tuned for the updates!

Nov 16, 2023

The Challenge is now closed

Thank you everyone who participated in Detect, Track, and Remediate: The Challenge of Small Space Debris!

The Challenge is now closed and all submissions will be passed for further evaluation. We received a great participation and we thank you for that.

We will be in touch with submitters very soon.

Stay tuned for winners announcements and other challenges hosted on Freelancer.com!

Nov 14, 2023

1 day left to submit!

This is your official reminder that we are one day away from the deadline on November, 15 at 5 PM ET!

Please be sure to complete your submission before the cut-off time!

As a reminder, if you are new to the platform, you need to have trust score of at least 35 points in order to submit your entry. So make sure to check Verification Page in Settings to improve it.

If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to us via Clarification Board or email at nasa@freelancer.com

Looking forward to seeing you ideas!

Nov 08, 2023

Reminder: Detect, Track, and Remediate: The Challenge of Small Space Debris submission deadline is Wednesday, November 15 at 5:00 PM ET

The submission deadline is only 1 week away !

All entries (submissions) must be completed and submitted by the deadline on Wednesday, November 15 at 5:00 PM ET. We strongly encourage you to submit your entry as early as possible in order to meet this deadline.

Please make sure to follow the Submission Guidelines to ensure smooth submission.

You can access the latest Webinar recording here . If you have questions as you are finalizing your submission, please reach out to us at nasa@freelancer.com.

We look forward to receiving your submission!

Nov 08, 2023

Q&A Tracker

Updated: November 8, 2023

Q1: Can an individual from the University submit without an organization's approval?

Yes, you can. The Challenge does not have any guidance in those terms. It is up to each individual's or team's discretion to decide which form of participation suits best.

Q2: Is there a different permission for an account within the system portal? So for example, is there a different level (authorized rep level, Admin. Level and etc) of permission on each account? Or can a person, the principal investigator, create/develop/submit on behalf of the organization?

The account created on Freelancer.com belongs to the person who registered, unfortunately there is no ability to assign different level of authority. The team leader assigned to each team (if not individual) will be creating the account, submitting the Concept, receive the prize and be the main POC for the Challenge team.

Q3: It seems like there is a mechanism to add team members. Is there a role for the administrator?

No, unfortunately not. You may share your account at your discretion.

Q4: Can a user save the application and come back later to submit the application?

There is no ability to save your Concept Paper and submit it later. However you are welcome to submit at any time and, if needed, you can update your entry until the deadline by submitting new ones. The team will pass the latest version for review and judging. You can also withdraw your entry at any time and submit a new one.

Q5: Is this only a proposal site or also the award management system, system for final report and etc?

Frelancer.com platform serves as the submission portal and award portal. The payment will be done through the platform to the team leader. You can also withdraw your entry at any time and submit a new one. The Challenge team will also be making updates on the Challenge page.

Q6 : If I have a proposed hardware solution that could be used for both the Detect/Characterize and Track categories, but using different processing algorithms to address them differently, would that be allowed if presented in 2 different White Papers? I'm mainly asking as there would be *some* overlap of described information in the 2 papers, and wanted to check if that would be looked at unfavorably during the judging process?

Yes, you can submit a single solution for two challenge areas if it addresses both problems. Please ensure you prepare two separate Concept Papers, as each Concept Paper must comprehensively describe one challenge area. While it's acceptable for the information to overlap, keep in mind that they might not be reviewed by the same judge, so there should be no loss of context, and each paper needs to be self-contained and independent from the other.

Q7: For the different categories being asked of, such as Description of Concept, High Level Concept of Operations, Challenge and Physics Based Justification etc, should these essentially be how the White Paper is written up as (i.e. with these as specific sections in the paper)?

Ideally, yes, that should be your guideline on how you would want to structure your submission. Those items are must haves for your concept, since the evaluation criteria is based on those sections. As long as you're within the page limit, you can add other information to it that you see fit. (there is no page limit for visuals).

Q8: I am submitting for all 3 challenges, and I have a question about the submission document. I have come up with 4 solutions, one for each problem, and a way to provide gigawatts of power with ~1000x higher power to weight ratio of nuclear energy. From what I've read it seems the process is designed for single solutions rather than a platform? If I copy the energy solution for each submission it would result in less than half the space for the task specific solution. If needs be, I'll do that, but it would be easier to read and complete as a single document containing all 4 solutions. I would then keep the task specific limit under 12 page total with instructions for the reader/assessor regarding this, but the total would exceed the 12 page limit. This will also allow me to provide the necessary context to describe and reference the system and tasks as a whole, without referring to materials I can't include because of the space limitations. Happy to do either, but this will make for the better product. Let me know if this is allowed?

Yes, each concept paper should be describing one challenge area as there might be different judges appointed to different areas based on their specialty. That was also made this way so that participants could dive into each problem, rather then doing a high level overview. If your solution can solve all challenge areas, you have to submit separate papers for each of them. It is okay for some information to overlap, since some information from description of the concept might be the same, however keep in mind that they might not be reviewed by the same judge, so there should be no loss of context, and each paper needs to be self-contained and independent from the other.

Nov 01, 2023

There are only 2 weeks left until submission deadline!

Dear participants,

That is your reminder that there are only 2 weeks left until the submission deadline!

Make sure that you follow all the instructions and guidelines to ensure that your submission process goes smoothly.

Here are the detailed instructions on how to submit your entry:

Sign into freelancer.com and go to the Challenge page: https://www.freelancer.com/contest/2307546

Click on the blue "Submit Entry" button in the top right corner.

Once you click on “Submit Entry” button, you should see the submission form.

Fill out the empty fields and upload your files at the top of the page (“Add Files”). Please note it only accepts PDF format.

In the licensed content choose “This entry is entirely my own”

If there is any stock content, you would need to choose “This entry contains elements I did not create” check box and then provide stock information (name and link)

For the price field, put $20,000

You can then add Entry title and Description (optional)

There is no need to add any upgrades to your entry.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the “Submit Entry” button.

If you have submitted your entry successfully, you should "Success" message

Important : If you do not receive the “Success” message when you submit an entry, it may mean that the trust score on your freelancer.com account is too low. You can improve your trust score by verifying your account in multiple ways. In order to verify your account, you will need to:

Hover your cursor over your profile name in the top right corner of the website.

Click on Settings

Click on "Trust & Verification".

Click on the verification process you would like to complete to increase your trust score. (you should have at least 35 points)

Once the score is improved to a sufficient number, you can go through the submission process once more and submit your entry

Hope this helps! Best of luck to you all.

Oct 31, 2023

Missed the webinar? Not a problem!

If you couldn't join the webinar on Friday, make sure to watch the recording! It is already available via this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJHdlKq7WGY&ab_channel=Ensemble

If you have any questions, make sure to post them on the Clarification Board or email us at nasa@freelancer.com and our team will be happy to help you as we approach the submission deadline in 2 weeks .

Oct 24, 2023

The webinar is just a couple of days away!

Hello Solvers,

Just a quick reminder for you that the webinar is just 3 days away!

Make sure to register here if you haven't yet! Get your chance to hear in a great detail from the NASA and Ensemble team and get your questions answered.

Oct 20, 2023

The webinar is 1 week away!

Hello Participants!

Here is your 1 week reminder that we are hosting a webinar next Friday at 2:00 PM ET. Don't miss your opportunity to ask questions directly to the NASA team!

Make sure to register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_tcjVWPZ2Rr-zcqxWa02yXA#/registration

Oct 11, 2023

Register for the upcoming webinar

Attention all researchers and innovators!

We will be hosting a webinar soon, where you will hear from the NASA team as they talk about the Challenge background, what they are looking for in a solution, and more! There will also be a live Q&A session, so bring your questions!