DW BUREAU / PATIALA Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology (TIET) chairman R. R. Vederah and director Prof. Prakash Gopalan here today announced the first student nano-satellite "thaparsat" to be flown in Low Earth Orbit. A highly dedicated team of 25 students and 6 faculty mentors from different engineering departments are involved in building individual sub-systems. The satellite aims at doing real time monitoring of pollution due to greenhouse gases, measurement of soil moisture content in primarily Punjab and in general, Northern India and regular monitoring of methane gas across the Indian sub-continent. It will be useful in monitoring the environmental and agricultural aspects across Punjab and northern part of India in general. TIET is collaborating with Data Patterns, Chennai for the student satellite project. Team at Data Patterns have been actively involved in assisting and mentoring the teams of TIET during different phases of satellite and monitoring station development. Management and the project execution team are extremely thrilled on the inauguartion of thaparsat Satellite Monitoring Station which embarks a landmark for their ambitous project. The station was inaugurated by Dr. A.S. Pillai, Founder CEO and MD, BrahMos Aerospace (member BOG, TIET) and Mr. R. R. Vederah, Chairman BOG, TIET, in presence of Prof. Prakash Gopalan, Director TIET, other faculty members and administration staff. The team aims to launch the satellite by the PSLV launch vehicle of India from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The proposal for the same will be shortly submitted by TIET team to ISRO. "The proposed satellite has potential of applications in areas other than air pollution and soil moisture content", qouted Dr. A.S. Pillai. To this Prof. Prakash Gopalan added that TIET is also planning to collaborate with different goverment bodies, research centers and univeristies across Punjab for potential applications using thaparsat and the ground-station available at TIET, Patiala. (editor@dailyworld.in)