ABU Zaria Developed Drone Using Local Materials
This is a corollary to my article of January 25th
2019, titled ‘updates on Nigerian Born Inventors: Celebrating the Invention of
Koniku Kore’. That article was a continuation to 5-series article published
between the last quarter of 2016 and first quarter of 2017. The article was titled “Nigerian Born
Investors, their Inventions, Challenges and Opportunities. My esteemed readers
may recall my assertion in the article; “that the list of Nigerian inventors
and their inventions are not exhaustive. A huge country like Nigeria with a
deep-rooted diversity and exponential increase in population, invention to
survive daily challenges of life is the order of the day. Necessity makes people
to think deeply on how to address their problems, constraints and threats
against their living condition. Necessity is the major factor making Nigeria to
churn out inventors in multitude”. This necessity created unquantifiable
inventors with unquantifiable opportunities to make Nigeria excel in several
human endeavors. These opportunities have potential to make Nigeria great among
the comity of nations. However, potential is like a large fertile farm with
good soil and uninhibited water; without cultivation, weeds and dangerous
reptiles will cover the farm and become dangerous to the owners of the farm.
The scenario of ‘necessity is the mother of
invention’ plays excellently for Nigerians abroad as they doggedly fight odds
to survive and outshine others. It is
within this framework that the invention of KONIKU KORE made by a USA based
Nigerian came to limelight with delight two years ago. The technology is
capable of making the seemingly ‘impossible’ possible in the global
technological revolution. Koniku Kore is a giant invention of the 21st
century, it is a device, which can fuse live neurons from mice stem cells into
a silicon chip invented by a USA based Nigerian, Oshi Agabi. The device is a
next generation neuro computing platform that can provide uses in security,
military and agriculture. An example would be that a single neuro-chip device
could sniff out explosives without even seeing it. The creation of this
seemingly synthetic brain is a breakthrough combination of robotics,
neuro-biology, computing and bioengineering. Details of this piece can be
accessed via https://breakthroughwithmkothman.blogspot.com/2019/03/updates-on-nigerian-born-inventors.html
Back home, ‘the necessity’ has created many
inventors over the years. Private and public sectors recorded scores of
successes in innovations and inventions of technologies to facilitate
development. Among the public sectors are the universities and polytechnics that
have labored to address national developmental challenges. Ahmadu Bello
University (ABU) Zaria is famously striving in technological advancement
despite system and environmental challenges. Recently, students of the
university developed a drone using local materials.
A 3-man team of final year students of Ahmadu Bello University ABU,
Zaria made a drone as their final year project and named it 'Hope For Chibok
Girls'. The drone was tested at the ABU stadium complex and worked perfectly
well to the surprise and delight of witnesses. ABU Zaria, as a citadel of
learning and excellence is relentlessly working and bringing fames to Nigeria
through scientific inventions.
Unarguably, ABU
Zaria is the largest university in sub-Saharan Africa, and the first university
to be established in Northern Nigeria in 1962. The university has graduated over
one million students from different academic programmes since establishment.
ABU Zaria is indeed one of Nigeria’s finest in the aspect of research, human
development and community service. Located in the heart of Zazzau Emirate, 70
km from Kaduna town, ABU Zaria is by all measures, a household name in
intellectual production.
With two major campuses (Samaru and Kongo), over 100
academic departments, housed by 13 faculties and 12 research institutes, a
student population of over 50,000 and staff strength of over 5,000, the
intellectual dexterity and creativity of ABU Zaria products is never contested.
The two campuses occupy over 7,000 hectares of land for teaching, research and
other academic activities. While some universities may have diverted from their
core mandates; but ABU has, over the years, been pushing hard to achieve her
core mission aptly captured: ‘To advance the frontiers of learning and break
new grounds, through teaching, research and the dissemination of knowledge of
the highest quality.’ Additionally, the university is aimed at fostering
national and international integration through the development and promotion of
African traditions and cultures; to serve as a model and conscience of the
society; and to produce high-level human power and enhance capacity-building
through training and retraining, in order to meet the needs and challenges of
the 21st century.
Today, ABU Zaria has certainly come a long way in
Nigeria and beyond, the university has far become a pacesetter, a trailblazer
and frontrunner, which other institutions emulate in knowledge production and
advancement. The university has grown to become the most influential and
diverse in the country. Current record indicates that almost all the 747 LGAs
in the country have sons and daughters either as students or staff or both
studying and working/living in ABU Zaria in addition to citizens of other
countries. This diversity makes ABU unique among the tertiary institution of
learning in Nigeria. In fact, the diversity has placed the university on a very
strong footing, making it more robust in pursuing its mission while making
effective contributions to all spheres of human endeavour.’
Over the years, the university has been assiduously
working, despite challenges, to achieve this lofty mission. It has recorded
many successes in different areas of human and national development. Time and
space may not allow me to x-ray all the breakthroughs made by this giant
university in the south of the Sahara however. The development of the drone by
the university’s undergraduate student is one of modest achievements in the
technological strides of the University in recent years.
Drone is an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), which
includes autonomous drones and remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs). Drone is
capable of controlled, sustained level flight and is powered by a jet,
reciprocating, or electric engine. Drone differs from a cruise missile because
it is intended to be recovered after its mission, while a cruise missile
impacts its target, damage both the target and itself. A military drone may
carry and fire munitions on board, while a cruise missile is simply ammunition
for a target.
Drone technology has been in existence since 1849 when
Austria attacked Venice using unmanned balloons stuffed with explosives. Over
the last ten decades, drones have undergone a rapid transformation in consumer
electronics with advances in technology and wide applications for military
operations and the civilian utility. Today, in spite of advances in drone
technology, drone manufacturing is limited to developed countries without much
contribution from developing countries like Nigeria. However, this is changing
as ABU conceived and successfully developed UAV with locally available
materials and improvised equipment.
Three students of Physics Department of ABU Zaria
undertook the task designing and construction of drone using readily available
materials. One student was assigned the design and sourcing of the construction
materials. Another student was assigned the design and testing of the
aerodynamic system of the UAV. The third student took the responsibility of
designing electrical system that provided the necessary power to overcome the
forces of drag, lift and thrust as well as the ability to manipulate the
control system from the surface while the drone is in flight. The combined
efforts of the three students produced a most desired result – a perfectly
flying done. The ABU drone was tested and worked excellently according to the
design.
The drone technology may not be an original invention
of ABU Zaria, nevertheless, the university has to be credited for developing
the drone with locally available materials. With more support, equipment and
infrastructure, the young scientists, the ABU students who transformed the mere
concept of ‘Nigerian drone - Hope For Chibok Girls' to reality can do much
better. The ball is in the court of the Nigerian society.
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