Enabling Long Duration Missions Through Holistic Habitat Design‘, got selected for a further presentation at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, USA. In the other competition held at Mars Desert Research Station in Utah, USA, the team secured the 13th position out of the 31 teams from 190 countries which also included 5 different teams from India. For the RASC-AL competition, after the team’s paper’s selection, they were given an opportunity to make a presentation on the topic in an event at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre. The rover created by the team for Mass Society’s University Rover Challenge successfully cleared all the tasks which included servicing of equipment and wireless operation. [caption id="attachment_25000" align="aligncenter" width="430"] KMC Mars Rover-03 in the Astronaut Assistance Task at University Rover Challenge, at Mars Desert Research Station.[/caption] “The rover we made was highly appreciated. It was capable of operating on the rocky surface of Mars and could also assist astronauts.” said Chetan Kumar, a third year Physics honors student of KMC who is also part of the Robo Physicists team. Dr. Mohanty, from the Physics department of Kirori Mal College, first came up with the idea of associating students from Delhi University to such international ventures five years ago and has also been active in numerous international conferences. Since then, the Robo Physicists society has taken part in numerous events including Lunabotics and the Rover Challenge. However, this year’s victory has been remarkable for the society becoming the only Indian team to establish such feat internationally. The society’s trip to NASA was sponsored by the University of Delhi. Both the projects were judged by people from the steering committee who were NASA engineers and the jury of RASC-AL, consisted of people from Boeing NASA. The Mass Societies’ Rover Challenge’s panel of judges included the alumnus of NASA. “We got to work with and know people and professors from different universities.” said Chetan Kumar, “There were people from technical backgrounds. At RASC-AL, we faced competition from people doing Masters and Ph.D. Without the knowledge of engineering and astrophysics, we had to go back to the basics to understand it.” According to Aishwarya Girdhar, another member of the team, “The best part of the experience that we got being part of this competition was the exposure and the feeling of pride in representing India among so many countries from all over the world. You don’t have to be in top engineering colleges to have the knowledge and KMC’s Robo Physicists Society shows that.” Image Credits: The official Facebook page of KMC Robo Physicists.]]>
Himanshi Bahuguna
A first year student of English in Miranda House, Himanshi can be best described as someone who loves to read, write and sing. She worships Pink Floyd and Kurt Cobain. When not writing quirky lyrics and articles, she can be found singing on the top of her lungs. She wants to spend her life exploring her fixation with country music and Chevy trucks while travelling and writing about it, listening to any Beatles song in the background.
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