With Local Metal & Big Ideas, 2 Odisha Students Are Crafting Satellites to Rival Nasa-Level Space Tech

As children, many of us dreamed of becoming astronauts. We gazed at the night sky, imagined floating weightlessly among stars, and built cardboard rockets in our backyards. But somewhere along the way, reality hit hard — college degrees, corporate jobs, EMIs, and nine-to-five routines to the place of those grand spacefaring dreams.

Yet for some, that spark never dimmed.

At just 21, Snehadeep Kumar from Durgapur, West Bengal, is turning his childhood fascination into reality. Along with Mohit Kumar Nayak, a Computer Science student from Bhubaneswar, they are working to democratise space research, starting with building India's first gamma-ray detection CubeSat through their student-led space startup, ‘Nebula Space Organisation.’

Their story is not just about chasing dreams but about making them accessible to others, too.

A dream crafted by an encyclopedia

Snehadeep’s journey began innocuously in Class 1, when his father handed him an encyclopedia and switched the television to the Discovery Channel. Space, in all its vastness and mystery, hooked him immediately.

“The idea of becoming a scientist started when I was very young,” Snehadeep tells The Better India. “Every competition, every project I did after that always somehow circled back to space and satellites.”

By Class 9, Snehadeep had built a model to demonstrate groundwater replenishment using morning cauliflower seeds for a science exhibition. A teacher’s offhand comment — that he should publish his work — planted another seed: what if there was a scientific journal that welcomed work from high-schoolers, students often sidelined by academic publishing?

Three years later, that idea took form as Aurora Academy Journal. Fueled by connections made through Discord, Snehadeep gathered a global team of like-minded teenagers who created a platform for young researchers to publish their research worldwide.

“We had 40 members from 15 countries. We cold-emailed Nobel laureates, and to our surprise, many responded positively,” he says. Interviews with icons like Babar Ali, the world’s youngest headmaster, and Nobel Laureate Robert Lefkowitz followed. Aurora became more than a journal; it was a youth-driven scientific movement.

But the hunger to do more persisted.

Challenging the space monopoly

In late 2021, Snehadeep and his growing team realised another massive gap in the ecosystem: access to space research and equipment was prohibitively expensive. “Even a screw could cost Rs 4 crores,” he says, a consequence of the heavily monopolised and inflated space industry.

In October 2021, Nebula Space Organisation was officially born. “We did not have a specific category in mind, but I was sure that we needed to do something related to space and make it accessible for all,” explains Snehadeep.

By the time he entered college in 2022, they had a physical presence. There, he met Mohit Kumar Nayak, a Computer Science student at KIT University, Bhubaneshwar, who shared his dream. In a funny hostel encounter— “We met in the washroom!” laughs Mohit, they found common ground and an immense love towards the realm of space, and decided to build something monumental together.

While the initial team swelled to 30, reality soon hit: job security and financial concerns led most members to opt for traditional careers. Only a core group of four remained, determined to stay the course.

Building CubeSats affordably

The team decided to work on the theoretical part of building ‘CubeSats’ — miniature satellites typically used for research, that would specialise in detecting gamma radiation. This niche was important: Gamma rays hold the key to understanding phenomena like black holes and cosmic explosions. Yet India had no CubeSat dedicated to this field.

“We wanted to focus on making CubeSats, because they will be efficient, where the size would be tiny compared to a conventional satellite. With the subsequent development of nano-technology, developing this is reliable and possible,” shares Snehadeep.

Their approach to building was radically different. Instead of buying parts from expensive aerospace vendors, they sourced local materials. “Aluminium 7075, used to make satellites, would normally cost $180,000 through a space supplier, but could be found for Rs 700 at a local metal shop in Bhubaneswar,” explains Snehadeep, who realised through intense R&D.

“There’s a monopoly in space manufacturing. We realised we could bypass it,” says Snehadeep. They cut the metal using CNC machines, ensuring precision at a fraction of the cost.

Their prototypes are modular and plug-and-play, almost like Lego sets. Controlled via a smartphone app, these CubeSats would provide real-time gamma radiation data, and even live camera feeds from orbit.

Manufacturing locally wasn't just about saving money. It was a statement: space should not be limited to billion-dollar organisations. Their project showed that with innovation and resourcefulness, even college students could break into the space industry.

“Creating our structures and PCBs allows us to be self-reliant, while also making it at a significantly lower cost,” shares Mohit, whose method will reduce the expense by 125%.

Trash — even a problem in space

Both Snehadeep and Mohit are deeply conscious of another looming crisis: space debris. “Aryabhata, India's first satellite, launched in 1975, is now space junk. No one even knows where it is,” explains Snehadeep.

But Nebula’s CubeSats can be designed with an end-of-life plan. “Using solar sails — thin, reflective surfaces that harness the sun’s photon energy — they can deorbit after completing their mission. Instead of cluttering Earth's orbit, the CubeSats would glide back into the atmosphere and disintegrate safely,” explains Mohit, whose idea was to address space debris.

“If it is near the geo-signal orbit, then it is easier to bring it back to Earth. We have a GNSS system for tracking and a TLE address, which is similar to the MAC address and IP address on our phones,” adds Snehadeep.

“The solar sail will drag down the satellite to the Earth's atmosphere, and it will be somewhere in our Earth's trajectory. We'll find the geolocation of it and retrieve it. We will not be making any debris in space because we don't want to add any more waste,” explains Mohit, all of which can be monitored via an app that is being worked on.

This dual-purpose innovation — scientific exploration without environmental harm — is core to Nebula Space Organisation’s ethos. 

The galaxy ahead

After two years of intense theoretical and structural research, the team’s prototype is ready on paper. “We need to see if our theoretical part works, and the possibility of making this effective,” shares Snehadeep. “If the practicality is an issue, then we need to start the theory from scratch again.”

“Ours is verified and fact-checked by scientists, but making the final product is a big challenge,” adds Snehadeep. “To put it into context, right now, people are venturing into 6G and researching it, but how to include 6G in individual phones is a huge challenge, which requires frequent testing.”

The team of four has submitted their research to multiple international bodies, and their paper was accepted at the International Astronautical Congress 2024 in Milan, one of the biggest milestones for any emerging space startup.

However, there's a big hurdle ahead: funding. Without seed investment, they cannot move to full-scale production and testing. They are currently in talks with venture capitalists and angel investors whom they met at the Congress.

“Our mission is simple,” says Mohit. “We want to make space research affordable and available for students and developing countries.” With India’s space economy projected to grow from $8.4 billion in 2024 to $13 billion by 2025, the country is fast emerging as a global space hub. Government reforms and increased private sector participation have further accelerated this momentum, making space innovation more accessible.

Their platform-in-the-making promises to provide free real-time space data to students and colleges globally, using just their educational IDs.

The vision is ambitious but grounded. If they can successfully detect gamma rays with their CubeSat — a feat no Indian entity has achieved — they plan to expand into planetary imaging CubeSats and interplanetary missions, offering affordable, sustainable satellite technology to governments and private players around the world.

“If a government or an organisation has a Rs 10 million budget for 100 satellites, that will be a boost for them. If you compare the cost of NASA, which is 500 million dollars per year, this is better,” Snehadeep adds.

“We need mentors who are well-versed in both Physics and engineering to guide us long-term. And the best mentors are from ISRO,” shares Snehadeep, highlighting the potential for India to succeed in the space industry.

While many see space as the final frontier reserved for billion-dollar corporations and elite scientists, Snehadeep and Mohit believe otherwise. They are proof that innovation doesn’t need sprawling labs or massive budgets.

“Initially, you need a pen and paper to become a theoretical scientist,” adds Snehadeep. As they gear up to test the prototype India's first gamma-ray CubeSat, built by students, they're not just reaching for the stars — they're building a bridge so that countless others can, too.

Edited by Vidya Gowri Venkatesh; All images courtesy Nebula Space Organization