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At 10 a.m. on May 16, on the lawn of the West Campus of the University of Science and Technology of China, several teenagers from its affiliated middle school slowly released a large helium balloon under the guidance of members of the USTC Student Amateur Radio Association. Notably, the remote-sensing infrared camera for forest wildfire monitoring hung beneath the balloon was entirely conceived, designed, assembled, built and tested by these junior high school students throughout the whole process.
It is reported that this marks the first ultra-high altitude infrared earth observation scientific experiment carried out by middle school students in Anhui Province. Designed to rise to an ultra-high altitude of nearly 30,000 meters with the balloon, the infrared camera takes continuous photos of the ground, and transmits thermal imaging pictures and geographic location data in real time. The teenagers who just released the balloon quickly gathered around the monitoring screen to track the real-time data from the camera.
"From the thermal imaging images sent back by the infrared camera at an altitude of over ten thousand meters, we can overlook the earth clearly and sense the temperature of different areas through the photos. It is such a wonderful feeling! All our efforts in the early stage are worthwhile," said Sha Yijiang, a student from USTC Affiliated Middle School and team member. "The success of this experiment has deepened my passion for aerospace and space science. The boundless sea of stars awaits our future!"
Why did these junior high school students take part in the experiment? Liang Hui, an instructor from the Science and Innovation Center of USTC Affiliated Middle School, told reporters that the school has maintained close cooperation with the USTC Student Amateur Radio Association in popular science education. This popular science payload project for middle school students aims to introduce real aerospace engineering missions into youth science and innovation education. The payload will be carried by MERLIS, the first satellite developed by the association, which is scheduled for launch around the end of 2027.
Since USTC Affiliated Middle School launched the payload solicitation task in January 2025, it has received numerous payload proposals from primary and secondary school students. After the first round of evaluation and the second round of online school voting, the project of Forest Wildfire Monitoring via Sun-synchronous Orbit Satellite stood out. This balloon-borne flight experiment is designed to demonstrate the whole process from payload operation to data return, and provide technical reference data for the final satellite-borne equipment.
How difficult is it for junior high school students to complete this experiment? According to Miao Qucheng, doctoral student of USTC and person in charge of the experiment, these teenagers with an average age of 14 to 15 had to overcome numerous difficulties, including preliminary research and demonstration of technical routes, as well as learning basic electrical knowledge, 3D model design, hardware programming, computer-aided circuit design, component welding and testing during the research and development phase.
Starting from late June last year, under the guidance of the radio association, several junior high school students started with basic circuit board welding. After months of research, production and debugging, the self-made camera prototype has realized basic functions including infrared image acquisition and data communication, completing the verification of core basic functions.
This experiment realized the integrated verification of the infrared camera payload developed by middle school students and the self-developed data transmission system of the team, creating a vivid on-site teaching scenario for teenagers and the general public.
Source: Anhuinews.com
