Karur: Md. Rifath Shaarook (18) along with five other students designed a satellite which weighs just 64 grams and is selected in “Cubes in Space” contest organized by Idoodle Learning in association with NASA.
Rifath, a “lead scientist” in Chennai-based Space Kidz India, is a resident of Karur distict in Tamil Nadu. He just wrote 10+2 exams and is awaiting the results. Small room in house is his space research center.
In the contest, 86,000 designs were submitted from 57 different countries. Out of 86,000 designs, 80 got selected and Rifath’s design is one among them.
It may be noted that his satellite is the only design selected from India. It will be launched into the sub-orbital space by SR 4 rocket.
According to the report published in The Hindu, the satellite is made of reinforced carbon fibre with 3-D printing technology. Shaarook and his team (Vinay Bharadwaj, Tanishq Dwevdi, Yagnasai, Abdul Kashif and Gobi Nath) designed this satellite at a cost of just Re. 1 lakh.
It is also mentioned that the team led by Shaarook took more than 2 years to design the satellite.
Shaarook who lost his father Mohammed Farook when he was a student of class V said that he is eagerly waiting for the launch of his satellite.
Giving the technical details of the satellite, he said that satellite would be in sub-orbital spaceflight for just 12 minutes and then will land back in the ocean. The task of the satellite is to capture and record temperature, radiation level etc.
Talking on the achievement of Shaarook, CEO of Space Kidz India, Srimathy Kesan said that his achievement would motivate other students too.