The project was conceived by scientists from the St John’s Research Institute to understand the medical implications of this interaction, particularly air composition and respiratory health.
Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs), which are used extensively in US and Europe for monitoring the atmosphere, could soon be a reality in India if scientists from the St John’s Research Institute, Bangalore, and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, have their way.
For the last three months, a team comprising scientists SN Omkar from the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Navakanth Bhat and Bharadwaj from the Electronics and Communication Engineering, (IISc), Prashanth and Prem Mony from the St John’s Research Institute, Bangalore, and Retd Lt Gn Dr VJ Sundaram, National Design Research Forum, have been involved in the design, development and testing of a prototype atmosphere-monitoring UAV.
The project was conceived by scientists from the St John’s Research Institute to understand the medical implications of this interaction, particularly air composition and respiratory health.
The technology — in the form of UAVs — is being developed by the Department of Aerospace Engineering and the sensor module — that would detect chemical composition in the atmosphere — has been developed by the Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering.
“The air that we breathe, in cities like Bangalore, may have undergone drastic changes in composition (chemical, microbial and particulate composition) mainly due to pollution. The quality of the air in turn can have serious consequences for the long-term respiratory health of populations living in such regions,” Prashanth told DNA.
“Currently, pollution is monitored using ground stations and mobile vans in cities like Bangalore. Pollution at higher altitudes often goes undetected and poisonous gases can travel across continents. These UAVs can detect such gases in urban, rural and industrial areas,” Kiran Kulkarni, a research assistant at the Department’s of Aerospace Engineering told DNA.
He said seven embedded sensors have been integrated into the UAV, each detecting a particular kind of gas in the atmosphere.
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