Ramesh Reddy Nidrabangi, son of an auto driver from the city, presented a research paper on Martian Atlantis Rover and Space Exploration (MARSE) project at the recently concluded International Space Development Conference (ISDC-13) at San Diego, California.
The conference was organised as part of space development contest by National Space Society (NSS) in association with NASA. The MARSE project was conceived in the context of the under-design Atlantis Mars Rover. Although he attended similar conferences in US twice, this was the first time his research paper was accepted.
Elaborating on the MARSE project, Ramesh told The Hindu “Almost 40 per cent of the project is completed and it took me 18 months to achieve this. The project report was submitted to NSS-ISDC 2013, San Diego, and it was one of the selected 120 research papers.”In appreciation of his presentation he was offered a challenge to design a nano-satellite by a Los Angeles-based company. The Nano-Sat designing programme is being carried out worldwide where the assigned teams are required to design a satellite of 10 cm triangular dimensions.
A private firm is planning to launch 27 Nano-Sats to Mars to develop a complete GPS system of Mars, and provide information for the future Mars missions.
He started the project in December 2011 while studying bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Designing at National Aerospace University in Russia (Khai-Kharkov Aviation Institute). In the second year of bachelor’s degree he moved to the Rocket and Space Technology department.
Ramesh Reddy said he was launching a space organisation called DCube Space for the benefit of students worldwide and to give them exposure to space science. The organisation involves 300 scientists, 600 professors, 1,200 teachers and 1,000 contributors who will enrich the 12,000 strong student DCube Space club. Also 160-200 Indian schools spread in 25 Indian cities and 7 international cities, including Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, and Hyderabad will get access to a galaxy of space scientists.
