‘Can-do’ students hope to send mini satellite into space

Science-mad students are hoping to boldly send a drinks can where no fizzy drinks can has gone before.

The transition-year students at Regina Mundi College in Cork have built a mini satellite that fits inside an aluminium can.

“The basic principles of the CanSat device are modelled on real-life orbiting satellites,” physics teacher John Murphy said.

The device includes scaled-down versions of a real space satellite’s main subsystems, such as sensors to measure pressure, temperature and power.

A communications system has been fitted which will use wi-fi networks to transfer the measurements to a receiver on the ground where a computer and special software will allow the students to analyse the data.

And the secondary-school students have also designed and built a tiny parachute system which will hopefully allow the device to fall at the correct speed and land safely.

The CanSat will be launched from an aircraft over Cork next month as part of the Irish leg of a European-wide CanSat competition, supported by the European Space Agency (ESA), Cork’s Blackrock Castle Observatory and the Cork Electronic Industry Association.

If it is selected by competition judges, it will be included in the payload of a special rocket the European Space Agency plans to launch from a facility in the Netherlands later this year, carrying four of the best CanSats from across Europe.

The mini satellites will be deployed at the edge of space and allowed fall back to Earth while running their experiments.

“The basic aims of the project includes, among other things, getting more young people involved in science in general and physics in particular,” Mr Murphy said.

Picture: Physics teacher John Murphy with transition-year students at Regina Mundi College, Cork who are among the students designing and building the CanSat. Picture: Denis Minihane