A team of Indian students have amazed the world by clinching the global 30,000 euro from Airbus. The jackpot has been given for creating the world’s first airplane that generates its own power by the vibration of its wings which can later be used to power in-flight systems.

These Indian students are spread across four corners of the world. Presently studying in Bangalore, Netherlands, US and London. They beat 518 teams representing 3,700 students from 104 countries and wrote their name in history in Hamburg. The team dressed up aircraft wings in a composite piezoelectric fiber skin that harvested energy from natural vibrations or flex in the wings.

“Our group, in consultation with an Airbus team has invested enormous efforts in ascertaining the technical and economic feasibility of our idea based on the current and projected states of the required input technologies, including battery and piezoelectric fibre composites as well as interfacing circuits, structural dynamics and aero elasticity. We have no doubt that our promising idea will see the light of the day within the next decade.” said the Team leader’s name is Sathiskumar Anusuya Ponnusami from Delft University of Technology (Netherlands).

Surprisingly, these team members have interacted verbally around the four corners of the world and worked for 24 hours a day. They physically met and faced each other in the final round. These bookworms put their efforts and used piezoelectric fibers which gather electrical charges from even the smallest movements during flight and help in storing the energy generated in battery panels integrated in the fuselage and using it to power auxiliary in-flight systems. This reduces the energy footprint of aircraft during flight and could even replace the entire power source for ground operations.