THREE final year aerospace engineering students of Kwara State University (KWASU) yesterday at the Fifth Undergraduates Research Day (URD) of the university displaced their talent as they showcased their built rocket prototype, Quadcopter, and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV).

The students, Abdulrahoof Sarafadeen, Abdulkadir Abeebulahi and Abdulwasiu Ahmed, said the inventions, locally produced with material wastes, were through the research grants given to undergraduates of the university by the authorities of the institution.

In the same vein, Gideon Awojobi, another final year student of the College of Pure and Applied Sciences of the university, who invented an electrical device that could trigger off the entire electrical system whenever there is a fault to prevent an outbreak of power upsurge, said he had received offers from neighbouring Ghana over the invention.

The URD is designed for students of the university to inculcate in them the zeal for researches and innovations that are relevant to the needs of their host community and the nation as a whole.

According to the spokesman of the trio, Sarafadeen, the rocket was designed with capacity to carry payloads outside the atmosphere into the space while the Quadcopter like the UAV was built for surveillance, aerial photography and obstacle avoidance.

He noted: "The grants from the undergraduates research was too paltry to bring out our intention beyond the level we had showed the audience today. They all saw how the inventions moved from point to another. They saw them flying in the space. But we are assuring Nigerians of our potentials beyond what we had showed them today if we have sponsors. We should stop depending on the United States (U.S.) for inventions. "We are grateful to this institution for not allowing our talents and ideas to waste. We used locally sourced materials to build all these machines; we indeed turned wastes to wealth. We don't have equipment to use and half of the money requested for was given.

We will need more money to move the projects to the next level."

He urged the Federal Government to make more grants available to youths with ideas on technological inventions, adding: "We have no regret being Nigerians but if we were born in America, maybe the story would have been different."

Speaking at the event, the Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Abdulrasheed Na'Allah, said the idea of the URD was to stimulate and promote undergraduate and post-graduate research culture in the institution.

Na'Allah said: "The traditional role of a university revolves around three core activities of teaching, research and public service through consultancies and other community-oriented activities. In the tradition of Western universities, the research function of a university distinguishes it from other institutions of higher learning such as polytechnics, technical colleges and teacher training colleges.

"The quality of a university is measured by its research output. Research is generally more highly regarded than teaching-perhaps because it is easier to measure. Research is generally better rewarded, for example by promotion-because its results are usually more tangible. It is our duty as university academics to be innovative and to generate new knowledge. The management of KWASU recognises the importance of catching them young when they could still be moulded."