The Hindu : Front Page : ISRO prize for students

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Sep 29, 2007
ePaper

Front Page

Front Page

ISRO prize for students

T.S. Subramanian/ Y. Mallikarjun

Ajith S. Padmanabhan

HYDERABAD: “I am very happy. It was quite unexpected. We didn’t know that they were going to award such a prize to us,” said 20-year-old Sowmya Lakshmi Rao, who jointly bagged the top prize with Sreekumar Panicker in the law category in an all-India competition for college students conducted by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

Talking to The Hindu after sharing the cash prize of Rs.10,000 with the other winner at the 58th International Astronautical Congress(IAC) here on Friday, Ms. Sowmya said that though her primary interest was international law, she might specialise in space law too as her participation in the IAC had heightened her interest in the subject.

She and four other law students were among the 50 college students, who were sponsored by ISRO to attend the Congress after their knowledge and creativity were tested through three rounds. About 3,000 students participated in the competition.

Ms. Sowmya, a fourth year student of B.A. B.L. (Hons.) at NALSAR here, said she made a presentation on “The common heritage of mankind in outer space” in the third round, which involved group discussion and interview.

She said space laws would acquire enormous importance in the next 10 to 15 years. Right now, the focus was on exploration of other planets but it would shift later to exploitation of their natural resources. “That is when space laws will come into the picture. There is a treaty now on using outer space only for peaceful purposes but problems will arise when space agencies start planning to exploit the resources on the moon.”

Sowmya Rao

The views of both developed and developing countries should be taken into account while formulating space laws. Or else, she feared, advanced countries would try to corner much of the mineral wealth of other planets instead of sharing them with other countries.

PG student’s presentation

Ajith S. Padmanabhan, first year M.Sc. Physics student in the Ramakrishna Mission Vivekananda College, Chennai, won the prize for the category of post-graduate students. His presentation on the specified topic, “Mining and manufacturing on the moon, and their future applications” won him a cash award of Rs.10,000 and a certificate.

In his presentation, he said, he provided the background on how mining of minerals could be done on the moon. He spoke about the various types of glasses available on the moon and their optical properties. His focus was on how these glasses could be used for making optical fibres.

“I am basically interested in astronomy,” Mr. Ajith said. “I applied because this field [astronautics] has something to do with astronomy.”

Attending the IAC was “a new experience” for him because many space agencies and academic institutions from all over the world took part in it. Papers presented in the IAC on experiments performed in micro-gravity interested him. He cherished the students’ interaction with Professor Yash Pal. “He was brilliant,” said Mr. Ajith.

Corrections and clarifications

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

Front Page