Yunus Sevimli, BS ’14, MSE ’15 and Ronann Carrero ’16 Build Fish Smoker in Indonesia

One of the most important industries for Indonesia, a nation of over 18,000 islands between the Pacific and Indian Oceans, is the fishing trade.

Many communities face the challenge of preserving their catch before sale because of lack of refrigeration, so drying and smoking fish by open flame is a common practice but is also an unhealthful, time consuming, and exhausting process.

Through Kopernik, an international non-governmental organization (NGO) and the Johns Hopkins Institute for NanoBioTechnology (INBT), MechE students Yunus Sevimli, BS ’14, MSE ’15; Ronann Carrero ’16 and Biomedical Engineering students Sakina Girary ’15 and Azwad Sabik ’15 visited the villagers and fishers in Tuban, Indonesia to observe the traditional fish drying process which was often done at local homes, which created a potential fire hazard.

The four returned with designs of affordable and safe fish smokers made from local materials, namely bamboo. The final fish smoker design was built and used by the villagers, who gave very positive feedback and suggestions for improving the designs further.

Yunus shared by e-mail from Tuban: “I had a very fulfilling experience, learned to work with bamboo and interacted with locals and engineers at a different corner of the world. Takeaways from [the class 530.403/404 Mechanical Engineering] Senior Design included conveying ideas through engineering drawings, following the steps of design process and working with power tools are once again proven to be very useful regardless of the location.”

INBT’s Dr. Jennifer Elisseeff guided the students through the process to successful completion and the satisfaction of Kopernik.

Find out more about the project athttp://inbt.jhu.edu/education/international/gei/, Kopernik athttp://kopernik.info/, and the INBT at http://inbt.jhu.edu/.

 

Azwad Sabik, Sakina Girary, Ronann Carrero, and Yunus Sevimli pause for a photo while building the fish smoker.

Azwad Sabik, Sakina Girary, Ronann Carrero, and Yunus Sevimli pause for a photo while building the fish smoker.