The space technology startup TeamIndus has announced the launch of Lab2Moon, a competition to challenge young minds across the globe to think beyond our planet and create an experiment to fly on board the TeamIndus spacecraft to the Moon in 2017. TeamIndus is the only Indian team competing for the Google Lunar XPRIZE, and with this announcement, marks the first non-government experiment to fly to the moon since 1976.

(Article by tech.firstpost.com)

With the new Lab2Moon competition, youngsters between 14 and 25 years will get the opportunity to design and build a project that “would catalyse the evolution of mankind” as a sustainable multi-planetary species, says the startup. It wants to challenge students to come up with unique experiments for their projects which could be investigating how seeds can grow in space , new possibilities in renewable energy, and so on.

Registrations are open today via L2M.teamindus.in. So, participating teams should be up to three members and write a 300 word overview of their project, share drawings and upload a 2-minute video explaining why their project should go to the Moon. The last date of registration is August 20. The jury of the competition includes scientists and technologists include Dr. K. Kasturirangan, former Chairman of ISRO. 20 teams will be shortlisted by 25 August, and these teams will then develop a working prototype by the turn of the year. In January 2017, the 20 shortlisted teams will be flown to Bangalore to showcase their project and the winner will be declared on 26 January, 2017.

Rahul Narayan, TeamIndus Fleet Commander, said, “The TeamIndus mission is designed to be democratic, inclusive and driven by the people. Lab2Moon reflects that ethos. We hope that a generation of youngsters will be inspired to become change-makers and help create a better tomorrow.”

Read more: tech.firstpost.com