Makerfest Summer edition 2018 or how to interact around new technologies

On 21-22 June, the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST) participated in the Makerfest Summer Edition 2018 that was organised by the BEE CREATIVE initiative and the Lycée Vauban, Ecole et Lycée français de Luxembourg. The theme of this national 2-day event bringing together educational makerspaces of Luxembourg was « Making great things in space ». 

As part of with the Bee Creative for Kids project – a FNR PSP Flagship project promoting creativity, talent and entrepreneurship spirit in the context of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) among young people - LIST animated  one of the workshops and provided an hands-on introduction to its development platform Kniwwelino. LIST’s researchers Valérie Maquil, Lou Schwartz, Johannes Hermen, Jason Baily and Christian Moll explained to primary school children that this platform consists in a development board, and Arduino library, and a visual programming environment to allow them to build their own interactive projects, and by this, discover programming and electronics. 

In this years’ edition, children could create either a hot wire game or a web-based weather station with the Kniwwelino. About 150 curious and motivated children participated to the workshop and were able to take their version of the project home afterwards. Besides the Minister of Education, Claude Meisch, many teachers, educators, and parents visited LIST's our booth and expressed their interest in the possibilities that Kniwwelino offers.  

LIST’s researchers also participated in the Makerfest conference cycles. On 21 June, Renaud Hostache (LIST) made an oral presentation entitled « Space remote sensing at the service of flood management ». The flood mapping and modelling activities that were carried out especially during the FNR-funded PAPARAZZI and MOSQUITO projects were presented. It has been explained how flood maps derived from satellite earth observation can help in the different phases of flood management. 

In this context the HASARD® service has been showcased. The HASARD® flood mapping and flood hazard assessment service that is now implemented on European Space Agency’s Grid Processing On Demand (GPOD) Platform and available to external users for processing the stream of data coming from COPERNICUS EO satellites, is the result of many years of collaboration between LIST and the European Space Agency (ESA). As of today HASARD® enables the systematic, automatic and reliable spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR)-based mapping of terrestrial water bodies to support flooding-related disaster risk reduction at global scale. For example, the events of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma in the Americas have recently provided a wealth of imagery covering the large areas affected by these events. Interpreting this quasi-continuous data stream in a timely manner using HASARD® has brought critical information to support decision making by national authorities in the US. 

Moreover, it has been shown how integrating flood maps observed by satellite can help in improving flood forecasts. The value of the HASARD mapping service has been effectively demonstrated in the framework of major flooding disasters that have hit many parts of the world in the last years. 

Later in the afternoon, Henri Perrin (LIST) presented his research work « Advanced manufacturing of composites materials: issues and applications ».  

Makerfest Summer edition 2018 allowed young people and the general public to interact around new technologies through workshops, conference and experiments by manufacturers. The next Kniwwelino workshops will be proposed as part of the Researchers Days on 30.11.-1.12. and the Makerfest 2018 Winter edition on 13.-14. December.