Kenya is on Friday set to launch its first locally made Ksh100
million (about $1m) satellite, officially marking the country’s venture
into space science.
The 10cm cube satellite, dubbed
Nano Satellite, was developed by researchers and students of University
of Nairobi (UoN) with the help of Sapienza University (Italy) and
experts from Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).
It will be launched from Japan. Education Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed will lead a delegation to witness its deployment.
“The
UoN Satellite will be used in collecting data on climate change,
wildlife mapping, earth mapping, weather forecast, coastline monitoring,
transport and logistics,” said UoN vice- chancellor Peter Mbithi.
In
2016, UoN became the first institution to benefit from a joint project
between the United Nations and JAXA that seeks to support educational
institutions from developing countries to manufacture own satellites.
The
project dubbed KiboCUBE was launched in September 2015. Japan provided
Ksh100 million ($1 million) funding and a platform for construction of
the satellite.
The university now seeks to scale-up its space programme by
churning out larger earth observation satellites. They hope to also
upgrade technology by including high resolution cameras for precise data
and surveillance.
“The successful deployment of
1KUNS-PF (Nano Satellite) heralds the next phase for UoN and Kenyan
scientists and engineers to develop bigger higher resolution satellites
with serious scientific and technological value for the country,” said
Prof Mbithi.
Prof Mwangi Mbuthia of the UoN’s school of
engineering called for partners’ support to help the university upgrade
its satellite ventures.
“We seek for support as we go
into space exploration and space science. It takes approximately $1
million to successfully launch one satellite into space,” said Mr
Mbuthia.
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