A York University professor’s proposal to send a Canadian rover to Mars in 2007 or 2009 was among the highlights of a student aerospace summit at the University of Waterloo this past weekend.
The Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute’s annual Canadian Student Summit on Aerospace brings together students, professors and members of industry to network and learn about research and breakthroughs in aerospace. This year’s summit was hosted by the Waterloo Space Society.
The keynote speaker was Canadian astronaut Dave Williams who gave an emotional talk about the natural love of space among youth. His message to conference delegates was that they need to continue to promote the benefits of space exploration to young and old.
This was followed by a panel discussion at which four speakers were asked to present their views on “Canada’s Next Generation of Aerospace.” The speakers included University of Waterloo president Dr. David Johnston, major Mike Barker of the Canadian Forces’ Aerospace Engineering Test Establishment, well known education advocate Philomena Bonis, and Brian Feeney, leader of the DaVinci Project, which is working towards the first manned, non-government space flight.
Ms. Bonis was one of the most eloquent speakers at the conference, and emphasized the importance of educating children to ensure strong leaders in all fields of science in the future. She cited a Chinese proverb: “If you’re planning for one year, plant rice…if you’re planning for 10 years, plant trees…if you’re planning for 100 years, educate people.”
Bonis said that while causes like health care and poverty are important, many will remain with us forever, and in the meantime we should not forget the dreams of children and adults who long to investigate the cosmos. She also said that the space industry is the only field that really unites everyone, since the talents and abilities inherent in disparate disciplines must each play some part.
In line with this comment, the rest of the conference was broken up into four speaker sessions at which delegates had the opportunity to hear from graduate students, professors and aerospace industry representatives in many diverse areas.
Industry speakers included systems engineer Eric Choi of MDRobotics, the Brampton based space robotics company best known for the Canadarm and Canadarm2 projects and currently working on new parts for their mobile servicing system on the International Space Station, including a two-armed robot and a work platform for manipulating objects in space. Choi was involved in the design of the Phoenix Mars Scout Mission, a mission to Mars recently selected by NASA to visit the red planet in 2007 and search for recently detected subsurface water ice as well as to determine the mineralogy and chemistry of the soil and measure properties of the atmosphere.
Many of the speakers were professors from across the province working in such diverse areas as smart materials, the application of nanotechnology and materials science to aerospace, and speakers from the Association for the Development of Aerospace Medicine (ADAM), located at McGill University and studying the biological effects of space travel. Many had ambitious goals such as sending a Canadian lander and rover system to the surface of Mars, called project Northern Lights, led by Dr. Brendan Quine of the department of Physics and Astronomy at York University.
The conference was closed by a passionate talk from Bob Richards, director of Optech, a company with deep connections to aerospace companies in Canada, to the Canadian Space Agency, and to NASA. Optech is a world leader in LIDAR (laser radar) technology, which has far reaching applications, both here on Earth in the mapping of underwater coastlines, and out in the vast reaches of space for the mapping of planet surfaces. LIDAR will be used to ensure that next generation Mars landers, including Phoenix, avoid obstacles and land safely on the surface.
Richards also co-founded several space advocacy groups including Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS), The Space Generation, Young Astronauts of Canada. In 1987, he founded the International Space University, located in Strasbourg, France from which new generations of space enthusiasts have graduated.
Richards was inspired by space popularizers like Carl Sagan and Arthur C. Clarke, and in turn has promoted the aerospace cause to the next group of students, inspiring new space societies and clubs which have appeared at many universities in Canada. The Canadian Students Summit on Aerospace, organized by one of those student groups, is part of this long tradition.
