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Natan Oliveira: he helped to create a project that will be sent to the space station (Julio Vilela / Veja SP)
In the last few months, the life of São Paulo student Natan Cardoso de Oliveira, 15, has undergone a turnaround. Resident of the Paraisopolis slum where he has lived since birth, he has been invited to join a group to create a space experience. His project was chosen by NASA and has just embarked in the United States for a congress in Washington. It will also accompany the launch of the invention in space – experience, a space cement, made with ordinary cement, lunar sand and biodegradable plastic powder, will be tested on the International Space Station (ISS).
"I even dreamed of traveling abroad one day, but I would never have imagined that it would happen so early, and for that reason," he says. Student of the ninth grade of the Municipal Elementary School (EMEF), located in the community, Oliveira won an Anglo scholarship to start high school in a unit of this institution. next year, and another from the English Magician School – he did an intensive language course for a month and a half, to have a good grip during the trip.
The young man embarked in Washington with his counselor, Camila Mafra Uva, professor of educational informatics, and Leandro Alves dos Santos, professor of municipal teachers of the regional council of education. They arrived in the city on Wednesday morning (27).
The Paraisópolis student with Camila and Santos: accompany the boy during the tripThe Paraisópolis student with Camila and Santos: companions of the boy during the trip (/)
The trip, to City Hall, will last seven days and includes accommodation at the local Catholic University. The other four students who are part of the group and have developed experience with Oliveira have gone up the day before. Three of them – Guilherme Funck, Laura D'Amaro and Otto Gerbakka – come from the Dante Alighieri College, in the gardens; and one, Sofia de Avila, comes from the Anchor project, an NGO in Cotia, in Greater São Paulo. Everyone is 13 years old. Dante's students had pbadages and stay in college; and Sofia was able to embark thanks to donations.
The launch of the project in space is scheduled for Thursday at 6:20 am (28) from Cape Canaveral, Florida. As they attend the congress in another city, the five students will attend the event on a screen mounted inside the National Museum of Air and Space, the museum of the space in Washington.
The project
The space cement experiment was selected from 72 projects presented by students of Dante Alighieri, EMEF Perimetral and Anchor Project. As a prize, it will be tested by astronauts at the ISS. If the results are positive, the material could in the future be used in buildings outside the Earth, either in orbital stations or other planets – such as Mars. Its strength is the presence of the polymer, the biodegradable plastic that is already used in the ISS, able to create a protective layer against the high radiation emitted in space, which can cause cancer.
The competition was organized by Garatéa Mission, a project created by a group of Brazilian researchers to encourage the development of space initiatives among students. "Our idea was to invite Dante Alighieri because the college was already our partner in previous experiences, as well as public school students," says space engineer Lucas Fonseca, project director. The selected institutions were the Anchor project, which maintains activities with Dante Alighieri and EMEF Perimetral, due to the high level of social vulnerability among the students of this school. The competition that selects students' inventions to be tested by astronauts has been in existence for fourteen years, but until then, it involved only Americans and Canadians. This is the first time that young people from outside North America are part of the team. "The staff of the Brazil-Florida Chamber of Commerce knew our research work and thought we were able to participate."
A total of 335 students participated in the competition and worked for two months – from August to November 2017 – on project implementation. "We first thought to send cement.But he did not have to send the common cement in the space; hence the idea of creating anti materials. -radiation, "says Oliveira.
The group, however, had mishaps in the way. "One of NASA's requirements is that the material does not release a lot of energy, so we had to define the right amount of each ingredient so that it does not happen," recalls L & R. He and his team turned to the USP and PUC labs for several tests, until they found the perfect formula.
After pbading through several evaluation stations, three inventions reached the final stage: space cement; an experiment to verify the effects of microgravity on blood stored for blood transfusion; and the intervention of chemical compound tungstato in the development of bacteria in the space. The final decision was taken by NASA, who chose cement as the best project.
The five students created two tubes with the same amount of space cement. We go to the ISS; and the other will be in an environment within Dante Alighieri. While one of the astronauts performs the tests at the space station, another researcher does the same thing with the other tube left in high school. The idea is that after the end of the expedition, which should last 30 days, the material sent to the ISS will return to Earth to be compared to the other tube.
"Our hypothesis is that hardening of the cement in the ISS occurs more slowly because of microgravity," Oliveira predicts. "We also find that it will not harden filled inside, that is, it will become hollow, only hardening on the walls of the tube." important is whether the formula will work, whether the space cement will harden, and whether it will be resistant or not for future construction. "
Dream of being an engineer
In Paraisópolis, Oliveira lives with her mother, the Bahian governess Edsônia Oliveira Souza, 46, in a three-room house: a room divided into two rooms – one for the boy and the other for the mother – a kitchen His father, the restaurateur José Cosme, is married to another woman and has two children, one of 14 and the other of 5. Currently, he is unemployed. Edsonia has worked in a family home in Campo Limpo for twelve years and earns just over a minimum wage per month. It supplements the income with the pension that receives from the father of Oliveira, of 200 Rales. "We do not pay rent, but I have to pay all the other expenses of the house, which is not always easy," she says.
Oliveira enters the school, a 20-minute walk from her house at 7 am. Lunch there and go home at noon. Since the mother works all day – she leaves the house at 8am and only returns at 8pm, Monday through Friday – the boy has to turn around. He prepares a snack with what he has in the fridge, heats dinner (his mother prepares it), does the dishes and arranges the house every day.
Two days of the week are devoted to robotics clbades, which take place at school in the afternoon. It is because of them, besides, that Oliveira has learned the NASA contest and has registered. He says he loves electronics and prototyping, but his dream is to be a civil engineer. "When I was about 8 years old, I packed some milk cartons, I was wearing hot glue and I built buildings, houses and streets. He built big cities, "he recalls. "My mother did not like it because it said it was a lot of damage, but it ended up going away," the boy said. "My son has always been very creative and hardworking.If you receive all this, it is because you have deserved it," says Edsônia.
In his spare time, the young man practices football with his neighbors in the alley where he lives or plays on the computer that his mother has won from his boss. Also watch videos on YouTube. "I like vlogs, especially Neagle and Edu Coffee," he says. The equipment, however, broke down two months ago. "I wanted to buy another one in the US, but I do not know if the money will go." After the contest, the boy and the mother started making cakes, pastries and cakes for sale in l & # 39; school. "The food and the ticket will be paid by the town hall, but I wanted to raise funds for my son to buy his little things," says Edsônia. With the sale of quiches, plus the gift of teachers and the mother's boss, both get, in the end, 800 reais.
The student has never left the country. The most distant place that has been so far was Sergipe, to visit relatives. With this sudden transformation in his life, he may already have bigger plans for the future. "I still want to be an engineer and make money to help my mother, but now, who knows, one day I can go into space," he says.
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