Papilio

https://github.com/Zeyad-Ayman-Mohamed/Papilio-Team-NASA-Project

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2tQbpXDqW4

What exactly does it do?

4-7-year-old children application: the application shows 5 main modes the human has: hungry, sleepy, injured, bored, and busting; then it asks the child to choose a mode and act on it. Initially, most of the available actions aren't applicable to space missions, then the application provides the actual action taken in those situations with simplified illustrations. Additionally, the application shows the animals' roles in space exploration by providing a reduced paragraph about: their history in space, their missions, their survival rate, and the microgravity effects on their performance (i.e.: spinning a web for spiders or producing honey for bees).

7-10-year-old children game: in this part, we exploit the exploration sense and curiosity of children to investigate the spaceship parts and activities. Following the same idea of modes used in the application, the game located the player inside a spaceship divided into rooms supplying this mode's needs. For example, the player enters the ‘space kitchen’ room in which he/ she finds delicious food (i.e.: ice cream) and some pills, the game pops up an instructive notification that illustrates the availability of foods in space missions generally; in succession, the player loses points if he/ she chooses earth food and win points if chooses space foods. Similarly, there is a ‘space zoo’ room containing some animals that have been sent on space missions with some information about their history there.

How does it work?

4-7-year-old children application:

• First, we take the name, nationality, and profile picture of the user; then
• we use a python code to extract the user's face from the provided profile picture and paste it onto an astronaut's body and popup a congrats message representing the user's country in the next space mission; then

• we play a short launching video (after the 'start journey' button pressing) then start a scene inside the spaceship with 5 possible main modes; when choosing hungry mode(for example), a small menu appears to choose a meal; when the user press 'order', a new window opens contain a simple illustration of astronaut food (mainly pills),

• the same idea for other modes but for the 'bored' mode there is a 'play with pets' icon which contains most of the animals that traveled to space; when the user chooses any animals, the application gives a brief about this animal's history and role in space.

7-10-year-old children game: 

• The game starts with the player in the spaceship's main hall surrounded by many rooms,
• when entering any room a small description and guidance notification pops up to illustrate the scoring criteria in this room,
• we enable only two rooms in the demo: the 'space kitchen room and the 'space zoo' room,
• 'space kitchen' room contains some delicious earth food: burger, cake, apples and ice cream and space food (represented by food pills), the child earns points when choosing space pills rather than other food,

• 'space zoo' room contains some animals that have been sent to space previously, when the player stands in front of any animal, a small paragraph containing information about this animal appears.

What benefits does it have?

The application offers a learning platform for kids (tomorrow’s heroes) about the space challenges by showing them the differences between simple straightforward solutions on the earth vs limited strict solutions on space missions. It shows also the heroship of animals in space missions and allows them to create an ultra-superhero that is totally space immune.

What do you hope to achieve?

We hope to light astronomy's passion and curiosity inside every child.

Software tools:

Matlab app designer and unity game engine.

Coding languages:

MatLab, python, and C#.

1. NASA Image and Video Library
2. NASA - animals in space: https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/9-12/features/F_Animals_in_Space_9-12.html
3. NASA - food for space flight: https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/postsecondary/features/F_Food_for_Space_Flight.html
4. Information from our interview with the Italian astronaut: Paolo Nespoli, ESA (for our college magazine interviews series).

The provided data has helped us understand the living style of spaceships, especially for animals: why were they sent? Did they succeed in their mission or not? What are microgravity's effects on their performance? and more.

How would you describe your Space Apps experience?

As we are participating in the universal event, the experience is different; the competition is challenging with no mentorship but really teachable, we’ve self-learned a massive skillset throughout the journey, and the final output is worth that hardness.

What did you learn?

• Hardworking,
• Cooperation,
• Self-motivation,
• Insistence, and
• Hope.

What inspired your team to choose this challenge?

We interviewed the Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli three years ago for our college magazine interviews series. He has shown us the other side of the astronomic mission: the challenges, the stresses, the extraordinary, and the responsibilities; we were out-of-minds from amazement, what’s a heroship? When we found this challenge, we haven’t thought: “it’s ours!” Who is our target audience? Children, those dreamy ambitious little heroes, just showing them the road:)

What was your approach to developing this project?

Learn by playing and analyzing: what is the first action you do in this situation? Why this action isn’t applicable in space missions? Why the alternative is better? So the kid is convinced by the delivered information.

How did your team resolve setbacks and challenges?

Cooperation is the magical solution to any obstacle.

-Illustrative cartoonish icons:

• www.freepik.com

-3D models:

• www.turbosquid.com 
• www.sketchfab.com

-Matlab Help Center.

-Mathworks Answers.

-face detection code: https://livecodestream.dev/post/detecting-face-features-with-python/

#KidsApplication #Astronomy #Animals #3DGames #Challenges #biology