It is said that you use what you have to get what you need. Researchers at Bayero University Kano (BUK), practically demonstrated this at the 6th edition of the National Universities Research and Development Fair  (NURESDEF) held at the Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka.  In this chat with Vanguard Learning, the leader of the team, Dr Abdullahi Adamu of the Dept of Mechanical Engineering, spoke on some of their innovations. Excerpts:

By Ebele Orakpo

EXTRACTION of solar grade silicon from rice husk ash:

The basic thing used in solar panels is silicon but not just any silicon, it has to attain a certain level of purity. What we did was to extract and purify the silicon from rice husk. They attained a purity of about 37% and at present, we are just above 97% whereas the purity level required for that purpose is a little bit above 98% so the research is still ongoing as we do further purification.

Roofing sheet from groundnut shells:

A researcher, Dr. Ibrahim Abdullah, developed a roofing sheet from groundnut shells. He made a composite of groundnut shell and plastic and then tested its properties for application as a roofing sheet. So many of the properties he tested were in conformity with standards.

Groundnut oil extractor:

This plant extracts oil from groundnut. It begins the process from shelling, down to the point where the oil is extracted from groundnut.

Groundnut sheller:  Removes the seeds from the shells.

Soybean sheller: Removes the seeds from the shells.

Soap plodder:

What it does is to extrude the soap and cut it into smaller pieces, ready for packaging. So this can come in very handy for small scale industrialists.

Solar tracker:

It carries a solar ;panel but for maximum output from these panels, it is usually required that the solar rays incident on them is always constant so because the position of the sun changes, what this does is to track the sun wherever it is so as to have a maximum output from the solar panels.

Stationary bicycle:

You see most people go to the gym to exercise and most of the time, the energy expended in the exercise is usually wasted. Rather than allowing the energy to go to waste, we decided to look at ways to tap the energy and use it and in the process, you can use it to power many things in the gym. So as you pedal away, the energy being expended is stored and accumulated which is then used to power bulbs.

Road cutting machine:

What this does is to break up concrete or asphalt. In the course of road construction or reconstruction, the road has to be broken up so this machine can come in handy. It cuts it up the way we want and then for patching and things like that. So it can cut any material that has up to a maximum strength of about 900 kilopascal.

Chicken de-feathering machine:

It removes the feathers from chickens. Once the birds are killed, there is a pot beside it so you put the bird in the hot water like in the normal process, then you transfer the bird to the de-feathering chamber and once it is placed in the chamber, after about two to three minutes, it removes the entire feather from the birds.

We would like to commercialise all these but more often than not, the problem we usually encounter is that we display these things at many of these fairs but then, we want investors to come in, look at what we have (which are actually prototypes) and then develop them further and commercialise them.

The pounded yam-making machine was developed over time. When we started, we had only the pounding chamber.

Later, we had a cooking chamber and a pounding chamber separately but now, they are integrated in one unit.