planetary care in the house of stars
The Astro Ecologies Institute connects ecological research and astrobiology, growing relationships across ecologies, technologies, science and society in the second space age.
The Astro Ecologies Institute
AEI is a futures institute in Aotearoa New Zealand, focused on the plurality of life across worlds and the discovery of life beyond Earth. The Institute connects scientists, researchers, design and policy practitioners and artists in a shared effort to grow research cultures that meet the complexity of the 21st-century.
The network supports connections across ecological and outer space studies, rooted in readiness and the realities of climate breakdown, responsible to cultural knowledge holders and communities, and working together for eco-social futures.
How can outer space be researched ecologically?
In 2026, the Institute convenes transdisciplinary research, supporting ecological, scientific, cultural and creative approaches, with a focus on the theme “communication and cosmos”.
Our online dialogue series, Cosmoimaginaries, convenes speakers across ecology and space research, Outer Space Studies, Science and Technology Studies, creative practice, and climate and disaster readiness. The series emphasises plural practices and situated knowledge, bringing together speakers from various fields to share work relating human and more-than-human imaginaries in a cosmic context.
Find out more
Cosmoimaginaries
The Institute’s programme, Cosmoimaginaries, invites speakers to share work on communication and astrobiology, the origins of life, the deep time of media, Outer Space Studies and cultural, societal and technological processes shaping space imaginaries and our current technological era.
Image credits: top image Cassiopeia A (Cas A) supernova remnant, James Webb Space Telescope (JWST); lower left Te Wānanga o Hina at Space Place; lower centre All Worlds, All Times play-test at Post-Detection Futures 2025, St Andrews; image right Ōtari
“No outer space, just space,
The light of all the not yet stars
Drifting like a bright mist…”
— Rebecca Elson, Antidotes to Fear of Death
