European parabolic flight campaigns with Airbus ZERO-G: Looking back at the A300 and looking forward to the A310

Aircraft parabolic flights repetitively provide up to 23 s of reduced gravity during ballistic flight manoeuvres. Parabolic flights are used to conduct short microgravity investigations in Physical and Life Sciences and in Technology, to test instrumentation prior to space flights and to train astronauts before a space mission. The use of parabolic flights is complementary to other microgravity carriers (drop towers, sounding rockets), and...