Introduction of Participants - The 1st CLTP, 2011
Lewis Hennedige Jayathu Dimuthu Kumara Fernando (Sri Lanka)
- Self-Introduction
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- Present Status: Arthur C Clarke Institute for Modern Technologies
- Present Position: Research Scientist
- Field of Specialization: Astronomy, Electronic and Space science
- Present Research Interests: Design of supercapacitor based voltage regulator, Spectrometric analysis of Planet Jupiter and Designing of CanSat
- Statement of Purpose
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As a space science promotional activity I was able to introduce the water rocket to Sri Lankan students in year 2005 and it is very much popular among school children at the moment.
Every year my institute organize a water rocket competition and students who selected from the local competition participate to the water rocket event organized by the Space Education and Awareness (SEA) working group of Asia Pacific Space Agency Forum(APRSAF) which organized by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency(JAXA).
It is the time to introduce an advanced activity of space science to the students. I found that through CLTP I will be able to learn new and advance space science educational activity.
So I participated for this program.
- Feedback on the CLTP Program
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This program was organized very well and I was able to learn the whole process of making CanSat during this period. And I got the opportunity of learning much advanced designs such as CubeSat. This exposure will be so much beneficial for me to teach CanSat to the students. This program provided me the opportunity of building relationships with people from other countries who involve in space science related activities. Further this link provided me good opportunity to acquire and share the knowledge. I have never seen a model rocket to my naked eye before CLTP. This is another new experience I got from the program. The new microcontroller "mbed" we studied in this program can be used not only for CanSat but for other electronic designs as well. The knowledge on sensors, different techniques of sensor interfacing and data collecting are very much helpful for future CanSat developments.
I need to make a suggestion for the next program. In this program we were taken to the electronics and hobby shops after finalizing the design but my suggestion is to first show the available materials and then let the participants to do the designing part. Then they can design the CanSat according to the components available in the Japanese market. After visiting these electronic shops and other hobby shops lot of new ideas will comes to mind and this will led to a totally new CanSat design.
- Vision for the Future
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I have already discussed with the engineering faculty of the University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka to introduce CanSat as a project for the undergraduates.
Then a competition can be arranged among them. These undergraduate will be able to design an advanced CanSat.
I have already given a brief idea about the CanSat to some of the lecturers in the university and they were happy to introduce this to their students.
I hope to conduct a workshop on CanSat in my institute as well.
Then I will be able to organize a local competition.