Byagowi, a PhD student and president of UMSATS (U of M Space Applications and Technology Society), is unreserved this day, two weeks before the third annual Canadian Satellite Design Challenge starts on June 11. The competition tasks university teams from across Canada to design a fully operational cube satellite鈥攁bout the size of a litre of milk鈥攖hat can conduct a space mission over the course of a year.
鈥淲e have to win because for me, this is personal,鈥� Byagowi says. 鈥淭his is the last year I can participate in this competition (and) what we have done with this satellite is amazing.鈥�
UMSATS took second place in the first competition, and they had a small technical glitch in the second that held them back, but they still won the Urthecast Outreach Award.
鈥淲e are always going to make little mistakes,鈥� says professor Witold Kinsner, UMSATS supervisor. 鈥淏ut here鈥檚 what鈥檚 special: 130 students from 16 departments, supported by 50 advisors from the university and industry and the government came together to do this. What a golden opportunity to learn. Even if we lose the competition, we鈥檝e still won.鈥�
This is experiential learning at its pinnacle. Students designed this satellite and pursued experimental ideas on their own. They worked alongside industry leaders or professors in fields other than their own. They had to teach themselves how to design an antenna deployment system, or, even less theoretical, about screws and bolts.
鈥淎t first glance, I don鈥檛 think many people can grasp the complexity of this project, and how much effort from so many people is involved. The university is loaded with beautiful projects, but this is very special to us. There has never been anything like this before,鈥� Kinsner says.
This project could not have moved forward without partners like Precision ADM, Magellan Aerospace and Phantom Motion.
鈥淭he people from the industry have provided invaluable advice about a lot of things,鈥� says Matthew Driedger, a master鈥檚 student and mechanical engineering team lead. 鈥淭hey gave us insights on how to make our design more relevant to manufacturing, things we would have never thought of.鈥�
Is he as confident about winning as Byagowi?
鈥淚鈥檓 a lot more cautious. I like our chances but just as we have improved our design and scope, so have all the other teams. It鈥檚 going to be a tough competition,鈥� he said.
WATER BEARS IN SPACE
Hyperbolically speaking, the latest version of UMSATS satellite, TSATS-3, will explore the boundaries between dead and alive and interrogate the merit of panspermia, the idea that life can travel through interstellar space and populate new worlds.
To do this, the satellite will carry two separate microecosystems that can support a colony of tardigrades, microscopic creatures commonly called 鈥渨ater bears.鈥�
The UMSATS鈥� project entails the biological team putting both groups of tardigrades into anhydrobiosis, a bizarre and astounding state of severe dehydration that allows the animal to lay dormant. Tardigrades naturally enter this protective state when their environment drastically changes.
鈥淚t鈥檚 like a deep sleep,鈥� says Viridiana Urena-Ramirez, microbiology graduate student and lead of the UMSATS biological team. 鈥淲e鈥檙e still working on the process of how best to do this so that they could be viable 鈥� so that they could remain alive in that state for such a long time. Once we can do this, we can rehydrate them and bring them back.鈥�
One chamber will reactivate its tardigrades once in orbit. The other will try to wake its occupants a year later.
鈥淭he second chamber will really shed light on panspermia. It will also shed light on if we can survive, or if we can send life to other places, because it takes a long time to travel through space. This will help us figure out if it鈥檚 possible or not,鈥� Urena-Ramirez says.
How does she feel about the team鈥檚 odds?
鈥淚 feel good because our mechanical structure is great. I鈥檓 really excited to go forward and see what happens.鈥�
RSS