The Hindu : National : 2,000 delegates to attend Astronautical Congress

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Sep 24, 2007
ePaper

National

National

2,000 delegates to attend Astronautical Congress

T.S. Subramanian

Fifty college students selected from India to join the meet

— PHOTO: P. V. SIVAKUMAR

All set: The Hyderabad International Convention Centre, venue of the Astronautical Congress beginning on Monday, is under a thick security cover.

Hyderabad: There is excitement in the air in the plush Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC), on the outskirts of this city, where the 58th International Astronautical Congress (IAC) is all set to begin on Monday.

About 2,000 delegates from 45 countries have started converging at the HICC and they include rocket engineers, satellite-builders, astronauts from the U.S., China and France, specialists in space law and chief executive officers of space industries.

The HICC looks like a global village with delegates from African countries, India, the U.S., France, the U.K., Japan, South Korea and so on introducing themselves, and striking up conversations.

Fifty college students from India, selected out of several thousands who competed in a contest, are raring to attend the IAC. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) organised the contest.

The students seem to be a confident lot as they sat around in the HICC, excitedly discussing how the congress would go. While most of them are from engineering colleges, five are students in law.

B. Abhishek from the College of Engineering, Pune, has made it to Hyderabad after he made a presentation to the ISRO on mining and manufacturing on the moon. His presentation focussed on mining ileminite, anorthite, iron and titanium from the lunar soil.

“We had to present innovative ideas because many of the ideas [presented by the competing students] were similar,” Mr. Abhishek said.

There was a three-phase selection procedure. In the first round, they answered a questionnaire on basic physics, and astronomy. About 2,400 students sailed through this round.

In the second round, they wrote technical essays. Out of 2,400 students, 235 were selected for the final round where they made presentations, attended interviews and group discussions. Fifty made it to Hyderabad.

Rojan Doss, a final year aeronautical engineering student from the Noorul Islam College of Engineering, Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, was selected for his presentation on mining and manufacturing on the moon. His was on to extract helium-3 from the moon’s soil. Mr. Doss said helium-3 was used as a propellant in rockets.

Atul Kumar Singh’s presentation was on electromagnetic shield to protect spacecraft from radiation. Mr. Singh, who is studying at the National Institute of Technology, Surat, said he had designed a system which would protect spacecraft from the radiation on the moon and satellites orbiting out of ionosphere.

Bharati Sekar and Payal Chatterjee who are two girl students from National Law University, Gandhinagar, Gujarat, are a bubbly twosome.

“Our topic was on evolution of international law with advances in space technology,” Bharati Sekar said.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National

News Update

Stories in this Section