SINGAPORE - Robots, rockets, and rooms mapped by smartphone were among the defence technology projects on show on Tuesday at a congress for budding secondary school scientists.
"There are many new frontiers waiting to be explored" in defence science, said Minister of State for Defence Dr Maliki Osman, at the Young Defence Scientists Programme (YDSP) Congress, held at the Orchard Hotel. "Unmanned technologies and robotics are one such area."
At the congress, Dr Maliki presented scholarship and academic awards to 88 secondary school students who excelled in mathematics and science.
Some of the 400 or so Year Four and Five students in Integrated Programme schools - the equivalent of Secondary Four and JC 1 - who took part in the YDSP also presented their research projects at the congress.
The programme, organised by the Defence Science and Technology Agency and Defence Science Organisation, offers students research opportunities and science camps in defence science and technology.
Defence Science and Technology Agency project engineer Ms Sharon Ang, 26, mentored a pair of students working on mapping indoor environments with smartphone sensors. She commented: "The YDSP is good because students get exposed to engineering before university; that will probably help ignite their interest in engineering."
NUS High Year Five student Girish Kumar, 16, whom she mentored, said that despite some frustrating moments wrestling with computer programming, he liked working with cutting-edge technology and "gaining insight into how the defence ecosystem works".
