In a team guided by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), forty students from seven engineering colleges in Bangalore and Hyderabad have been included to create a 'Pico satellite'. The students are busy building the smallest satellite for their country at the Nitte Meenakshi Institute of Technology (NMIT), Bangalore. The satellite resembles a small cube – weighs only 850 gm and has a volume of 1.1 litres. It contains an imaging camera with a 90m resolution and will perform the function of a remote-sensing satellite.
The satellite will be launched in December through PSLV to a 700-km orbit. The team members have even prepared a ground station. An antenna has already been placed on the terrace to detect the position of the satellite. The satellite will be controlled by them from this ground station once it is launched. All the chores, from designing to welding and compiling of structures, are being done by the students themselves. The group is a heterogeneous one with students from NMIT, Rashtriya Vidyalaya College of Engineering (RVCE), B M S Institute of Technology (BMSIT), M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology (MSRIT) in Bangalore and Institute of Aeronautical Engineering (IARE), Chaitanya Bharathi Institute of Technology (CBIT) and Vignan Institute of Technology and Science (VITS) in Hyderabad. While the Bangalore students have made NMIT their base, their Hyderabad mates work from their respective college labs.
