Filipino Researchers Bagged First Place at the Space Mission Idea Contest in Japan
Upon their initial try that was elemental for the Philippines as well, a group of Filipino researchers was conferred as the top of the bunch in the 6th Space Mission Idea Contest (MIC6)—whose final presentation took place during the 7th University Space Engineering Consortium-Global Meeting held at the University of Tokyo in Japan.
The four researchers hailing from the University of the Philippines Diliman partook under the IVA-replaceable Small Exposed Experiment Platform category, upon which they were the first place of through their paper entitled Spectrum Monitoring from Space with i-SEEP (SMoSiS)–Capturing and Mapping the Digital Divide from Space through Radio Frequency Spectrum Measurements.
The authors Mar Francis D. De Guzman, Genedyn Gems S. Mendoza, Calvin Artemies G. Hilario, and Dr. Joel Joseph S. Marciano, Jr. foremost put the focus on acquiring radio frequency spectrum utilization and occupancy data on a global scale.
By having the data at hand and thereafter sharing the raw and processed data to the general public, it hopes to bridge the digital divide that is deemed a serious matter amid the digital age.
MIC6’s evaluation criteria were based on two factors, with each amounting to 5o points: originality and feasibility.
Apart from a certificate, the researchers were granted with 25% discount on a 1U-3U size payload for six months operations for a launch within two years from the award, as well as monetary award amounting 50,000 Japanese yen or at least Php 23,000.
“Our expectation was ‘let’s just have fun explaining this idea to a big audience that this is not your typical science experiment. It’s an experiment for public good, illuminating the state of this infrastructure and connectivity in sharing it openly,” said Dr. Mariano Jr., the Director-General of the Philippine Space Agency.
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The Mission Idea Contest (MIC) began in 2010 and has since been providing opportunities centered on introducing their creative ideas on an international scale to aerospace engineers, college students, consultants, and basically anybody interested in space.
Notably, it aims to unearth a new perspective with regard to space exploration and exploitation.
Source: UNISEC Global’s website
Images grabbed from UNISEC Global’s website
