Four students of a local school in Orissa, who won second prize in the 'National Aeronautics and Space Agency Space Settlement Design Contest', have left for the United States at the invitation of the space center.

Vilas Mishra (Group leader), Amitav Mohanty, Soumya Ranjan Pati and Ashima Kar, who studied at the ISPAT English Medium School in Rourkela, left on Friday accompanied by their guide B B Mathur after completing visa formalities in Kolkata, Rourkela steel plant sources said.

After being invited to visit NASA [Images], the budding scientists met Orissa Chief Minister seeking his help in facilitating their visit to the US, for which Naveen Patnaik sanctioned Rs 5.3 lakh, the sources said.

Altogether 95 teams from all over the world had participated in the contest to design a space settlement.

The quartet had come forward with a design christened 'Eden,' an imaginary dwelling place in space. In the project, the students had visualised a settlement in space, which could accomodate about 10,000 people. From the positioning of the settlement in space to its size and structure, everything had been meticulously worked out by the students.

It had envisaged all requirements, including source of soil, water and air to tackle the gravitational force, temperature control, power requirement and suitable ecological, biological, technological and social patterns.

'Eden' had been depicted as a clean and green place free of many of the problems faced on earth.