Indian Space Capabilities

[nitesh]

The Space Review: India on the ISS: it starts with a rack

India’s accomplishments in space, including the launch last month of its first lunar mission (above), warrant including it in the ISS partnership in some manner. (credit: ISRO)

India on the ISS: it starts with a rack
by Taylor Dinerman
Monday, November 17, 2008

As the International Space Station (ISS) nears completion, the partnership that built it needs to expand. It is not just a question of new resources, though of course spreading the expense amongst a wider number of partners would lead to small reductions in the operating costs paid for by the current partners. There are, however, two other, more important reasons: ideas and politics.

The current partners—the US, Russia, ESA, Canada, and Japan—may still be engaged in finding ways to use the “World Class Laboratory” they have built, but they are still doing so within the limits and using the procedures they have established over many years. It has been hard just to build the station, and this effort has distracted the leaders of these government space agencies from preparing to utilize the facility to the fullest extent possible.

It has been natural for those involved in the project to concentrate on the task at hand and not to get distracted by plans and preparations that can only bear fruit if the job is completed. Now, however, the time has come to begin to change the focus and to seek ways to get the maximum return on the investment that has been made. The US Congress’s decision to designate the ISS as a national laboratory is a step in this direction.

The partnership now needs new sources of ideas and new people who will bring a new perspective to the program. Obviously China and India are the first candidates for membership. China seems to be holding its cards close to its vest, and the continuing lack of real transparency in their program will make it hard for them to join up any time soon. India, on the other hand, has opened itself to international cooperation and has proven itself a reliable and talented partner.

India’s Chandrayaan-1 moon mission has not only been a scientific and technological success, but it has been an international political winner. By incorporating instruments from Europe and the US as well as their own ones, and doing so in an open way, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has proven itself to be, without question, one of the world’s top space agencies.

ISRO wants to follow up this mission with another Moon mission and then a Mars mission. More to the point, ISRO has begun studying a two-person capsule that could put India in the same league with Russia, the US, and China: nations that are able to launch humans into orbit. For the moment, the only reasonable destination for such a spacecraft is the ISS.

India has not only proved itself with Chandrayaan, it has also made a critically important step towards a truly civil space program, by setting up a military space command. This separation puts India well within international norms and indicates that the government in New Dehli wants to make it fairly easy for ISRO to join international space projects, such as the ISS. By itself, this will not solve the problems with the transfer of sensitive dual-use technology, but it shows that India is ready to take those concerns into consideration. Of course, life would be easier for everyone if the US were able to seriously reform export control regulations.

One obstacle to India’s joining the ISS is lack of money. This is what killed Brazil’s membership and preliminary talks with India should be careful to insure that ISRO’s commitments are compatible with India’s overall budgetary policy. It spite of its limited funds, ISRO has already taken steps along the path to developing its own system for manned spaceflight.

In January 2007 they launched their Space Capsule Recovery Experiment on one of their Polar Satellite Launch Vehicles (PSLV). The experiment stayed in orbit for 12 days and was recovered by the Indian Coast Guard and Indian Navy in the Bay of Bengal. Among other things this showed that ISRO has the capability to design and build workable ablative heat shields that could be used for manned capsules. No one really knows how long it will take them to build their new capsule, but it will be interesting to watch the process they use to human-rate the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) they plan to use.

What makes sense for the ISS partnership in the short term is to offer India full control of an experimental rack. The agreement with Japan stipulates that a number of the racks in the Kibo module will be controlled by NASA. Since the US has been cutting back on some of the science work it once planned to do on the ISS, it would be logical to offer this space to India, free of charge. ISRO could then take charge of outfitting the rack with experiments devised by Indian scientists.

At some point India could begin to fly its own astronauts to the station, either on one of the last Shuttle flights or with the Russians. They have not had anyone in orbit since Rakesh Sharma flew to the Salyut 7 station in 1984. It’s about time that an Indian citizen returned to space.

India has earned the right to be considered a full-fledged spacefaring nation. Inviting them to be a full partner on the ISS will simply make clear what everyone in the space industry already knows. It would also be a nice way for President Obama to begin his administration’s relationship with the world’s most populous democracy.

 

[nitesh]

Chandrayaan-II cleared by govt, to be in orbit by 2011-12
17 Nov 2008, 2142 hrs IST, PTI


COIMBATORE: Even as India's maiden lunar probe
circles the moon, the Centre has given its approval for Chandrayaan-II and it would be in orbit by 2012.

ISRO has started necessary research workfor the next mission for which the Centre has sanctioned necessary funds, Chandrayaan-I Project Director Mylswamy Annadurai told reporters. The second mission would be a fully indigenous one, he said.

Chandrayan-I is the best thing to happen to Indian space research and is designed to study the water availability and fertile standards of moon, he said.

The moon mission has proved that India is on par with any other nation which ventured to the earth's satellite, he said.

Stating that the pictures being received from moon were giving very valuable inputs, he said steps are being made to get continuous pictures by making some technical corrections.

Earlier, the Scientist was felicitated by the public at different places in Coimbatore district for the successful launch of the country's moon mission.

Accepting the felicitations, Annadurai exhorted the students to shelve their foreign dreams as opportunities were available within India.

The days of foreign students coming to India in pursuit of research works and higher studies were not far away, he said.


Chandrayaan-II cleared by govt, to be in orbit by 2011-12- ET Cetera-News By Industry-News-The Economic Times

 

[Halaku Khan]

The Arab Probe
Ghassan Charbel Al-Hayat - 17/11/08//

One is supposed to cheerfully welcome any scientific or technological advancement achieved by a close or remote nation, especially if this advancement has nothing to do with an aggressive military project or a hegemonic scheme. Yet, I must admit that I was overtaken by frustration and envy when the news agencies circulated the story of the Indian probe. The India Space Research Organization announced that a tiny probe no bigger than a small TV set has landed on the moon as part of the first Indian unmanned lunar mission. The probe split from the satellite Chandrayaan-1 (which stands for lunar vehicle) on its way on a two-year mission to capture three dimensional images of the lunar surface, particularly in the two dark poles, in addition to searching for water or snow on that same surface and identifying the chemical structure of some rocks. This mission crowns the efforts by the India Space Research Organization that was established 45 years ago.

This event can be understood in light of the Indian-Chinese competition. Mao Zedong's nation no longer accepts to sit in the back seat whether in terms of economic or technological development. It no longer accepts American or Russian leadership in challenging fields, and Chinese scientists are currently busy with the preparations for sending a Chinese to the moon.

I felt envious. Had India followed our path, it would now been an ocean of the starving and unemployed. Instead, it chose a different path. It is true that hundreds of millions are still living at or below the poverty line, but it is also true that this nation, which has secured its position in the nuclear club, has also achieved massive progress in the computer and chip industries. With the scenarios predicting the rise of Asia in the coming phase, many states have already started building commercial, scientific and technological relations with the Indian giant. This is attributed to two reasons: India's success in rehabilitating itself to play a major role, and the desire of several states to keep the Chinese giant in check by formulating an alliance with the Indian giant.

My preoccupation with the Indian probe did not prevent me from following Arab news, which is always sweet and reassuring. Arab League Secretary General broke startling news to al-Mutanabbi's descendants when he announced that the Arab world's population of illiterates has now reached 100 million. This means that the illiterate in the Arab world easily constitute a population bigger than that of Germany - without counting the semi-illiterate and the technologically illiterate.

I was about to forget the story of the 100 million illiterates when I found myself facing other news. The First Arab Report on Cultural Development revealed that reading is not among the established habits of Arabs. The report noted that published books in the various fields of science and knowledge represent no more than 15% of all books published in the Arab world last year. It also noted that one book is published for every 12,000 Arabs versus one book for every 500 Britons and 900 Germans. In other words, the reading average in the Arab world is almost 4% of that in Britain.

I was taken by a sense of defeat that was doubled as I read about an incentive plan by the German government aiming at attracting brilliant researchers from all over the world. The plan offers deserving and willing researchers the opportunity to finance their projects on German territory with expected great returns, including the opportunity to restore German universities to the top ranks among the best universities in the world.

It is no secret that the future is made today, in schools, universities, research centers and technological institutes. Evidently we are losing the battle for the future. We are not asking for sending an Arab probe to the moon. We demand probing the Arab mind itself to find out how it has frozen and discover how we can bring its comatose state to an end. The largest party in the Arab world is the party of illiterates. The loudest voice in the Arab world is that of the semi-illiterate. This is horrific. The probe has to dig deep inside the Arab mind before it can find out what went wrong. We neither write nor read, and if we write, it is ancient language that we produce. This is why we have lost our status and this is why we envy the Indian probe. We have lost the space too and won nothing but the enjoyment of a pleasurable nap in front of TV screens.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Note from Halaku: Thanks to Arab friends for their complements. I'm sure India will be happy to collaborate with the Arab world in technical fields.

 

[nitesh]

Hydrogen fuel bus from ISRO to hit roads

Hydrogen fuel bus from ISRO to hit roads

Express News Service
First Published : 18 Nov 2008 04:53:00 AM IST
Last Updated : 18 Nov 2008 10:41:12 AM IST

BANGALORE: After the success of Chandaryaan- 1 mission, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists have now successfully developed another project which will further enhance their reputation.

They have developed hydrogen fuel cells to power an automobile bus by using the expertise of the homegrown cryogenic technology for rockets.

The first proto-model of the bus is already assembled and by next year it is expected to hit the road.

The project is a two-year effort and now the scientists are preparing for the fuel cells to be fitted into a bus. In 2006, ISRO and Tata Motors had entered into an agreement to design and develop an automobile bus using hydrogen as a fuel through fuel cell route.

The Tatas will handle the locomotive part and hydrogen handling system of the bus.

HOW IT WORKS?

Hydrogen would be fed to the fuel cells which would then produce 80 kw of electric power to drive the bus.

The bus which would be on the lines of CNG model will have hydrogen stored in eight bottles at high pressure atop the bus. However, the cost of running hydrogen-fuel powered buses would be higher than the conventional vehicles run on diesel.

But its environmental-friendly and zero-pollution factors would go a long way in ridding our cities of vehicular pollution and enable us to earn some carbon credits.

 

[nitesh]

Hydrogen fuel bus from ISRO to hit roads

Hydrogen fuel bus from ISRO to hit roads

Express News Service
First Published : 18 Nov 2008 04:53:00 AM IST
Last Updated : 18 Nov 2008 10:41:12 AM IST

BANGALORE: After the success of Chandaryaan- 1 mission, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists have now successfully developed another project which will further enhance their reputation.

They have developed hydrogen fuel cells to power an automobile bus by using the expertise of the homegrown cryogenic technology for rockets.

The first proto-model of the bus is already assembled and by next year it is expected to hit the road.

The project is a two-year effort and now the scientists are preparing for the fuel cells to be fitted into a bus. In 2006, ISRO and Tata Motors had entered into an agreement to design and develop an automobile bus using hydrogen as a fuel through fuel cell route.

The Tatas will handle the locomotive part and hydrogen handling system of the bus.

HOW IT WORKS?

Hydrogen would be fed to the fuel cells which would then produce 80 kw of electric power to drive the bus.

The bus which would be on the lines of CNG model will have hydrogen stored in eight bottles at high pressure atop the bus. However, the cost of running hydrogen-fuel powered buses would be higher than the conventional vehicles run on diesel.

But its environmental-friendly and zero-pollution factors would go a long way in ridding our cities of vehicular pollution and enable us to earn some carbon credits.

 

[jeypore]

India on the ISS: it starts with a rack



As the International Space Station (ISS) nears completion, the partnership that built it needs to expand. It is not just a question of new resources, though of course spreading the expense amongst a wider number of partners would lead to small reductions in the operating costs paid for by the current partners. There are, however, two other, more important reasons: ideas and politics.

The current partners—the US, Russia, ESA, Canada, and Japan—may still be engaged in finding ways to use the “World Class Laboratory” they have built, but they are still doing so within the limits and using the procedures they have established over many years. It has been hard just to build the station, and this effort has distracted the leaders of these government space agencies from preparing to utilize the facility to the fullest extent possible.

It has been hard just to build the station, and this effort has distracted the leaders of these government space agencies from preparing to utilize the facility to the fullest extent possible.
It has been natural for those involved in the project to concentrate on the task at hand and not to get distracted by plans and preparations that can only bear fruit if the job is completed. Now, however, the time has come to begin to change the focus and to seek ways to get the maximum return on the investment that has been made. The US Congress’s decision to designate the ISS as a national laboratory is a step in this direction.

The partnership now needs new sources of ideas and new people who will bring a new perspective to the program. Obviously China and India are the first candidates for membership. China seems to be holding its cards close to its vest, and the continuing lack of real transparency in their program will make it hard for them to join up any time soon. India, on the other hand, has opened itself to international cooperation and has proven itself a reliable and talented partner.

India’s Chandrayaan-1 moon mission has not only been a scientific and technological success, but it has been an international political winner. By incorporating instruments from Europe and the US as well as their own ones, and doing so in an open way, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has proven itself to be, without question, one of the world’s top space agencies.

ISRO wants to follow up this mission with another Moon mission and then a Mars mission. More to the point, ISRO has begun studying a two-person capsule that could put India in the same league with Russia, the US, and China: nations that are able to launch humans into orbit. For the moment, the only reasonable destination for such a spacecraft is the ISS.

India has not only proved itself with Chandrayaan, it has also made a critically important step towards a truly civil space program, by setting up a military space command. This separation puts India well within international norms and indicates that the government in New Dehli wants to make it fairly easy for ISRO to join international space projects, such as the ISS. By itself, this will not solve the problems with the transfer of sensitive dual-use technology, but it shows that India is ready to take those concerns into consideration. Of course, life would be easier for everyone if the US were able to seriously reform export control regulations.

One obstacle to India’s joining the ISS is lack of money. This is what killed Brazil’s membership and preliminary talks with India should be careful to insure that ISRO’s commitments are compatible with India’s overall budgetary policy. It spite of its limited funds, ISRO has already taken steps along the path to developing its own system for manned spaceflight.

In January 2007 they launched their Space Capsule Recovery Experiment on one of their Polar Satellite Launch Vehicles (PSLV). The experiment stayed in orbit for 12 days and was recovered by the Indian Coast Guard and Indian Navy in the Bay of Bengal. Among other things this showed that ISRO has the capability to design and build workable ablative heat shields that could be used for manned capsules. No one really knows how long it will take them to build their new capsule, but it will be interesting to watch the process they use to human-rate the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) they plan to use.

India has earned the right to be considered a full-fledged spacefaring nation. Inviting them to be a full partner on the ISS will simply make clear what everyone in the space industry already knows.
What makes sense for the ISS partnership in the short term is to offer India full control of an experimental rack. The agreement with Japan stipulates that a number of the racks in the Kibo module will be controlled by NASA. Since the US has been cutting back on some of the science work it once planned to do on the ISS, it would be logical to offer this space to India, free of charge. ISRO could then take charge of outfitting the rack with experiments devised by Indian scientists.

At some point India could begin to fly its own astronauts to the station, either on one of the last Shuttle flights or with the Russians. They have not had anyone in orbit since Rakesh Sharma flew to the Salyut 7 station in 1984. It’s about time that an Indian citizen returned to space.

India has earned the right to be considered a full-fledged spacefaring nation. Inviting them to be a full partner on the ISS will simply make clear what everyone in the space industry already knows. It would also be a nice way for President Obama to begin his administration’s relationship with the world’s most populous democracy.

The Space Review: India on the ISS: it starts with a rack

 

[nitesh]

The Hindu Business Line : ‘It’s a turning point for ISRO’


‘It’s a turning point for ISRO’


Dr G. Madhavan Nair

Madhumathi D.S.

Bangalore, Nov. 18 The October-November 2008 Chandrayaan-1 gave India its Moon and caps the dauntless spirit of the 40-year-old national space programme: the wholly indigenous agenda kept its head up amidst external adversities most of its time.

If it met pressing national needs of communication, broadcasting and disaster management in its early 30 years, it chose to harvest the investment in it by going commercial during the late 1990s with its launch and satellite services. ISRO in Version 3 says it has matured enough to start an exciting but challenging journey on its own into deep space. Excerpts from an interview that Dr G. Madhavan Nair, ISRO Chairman and Secretary, Department of Space, gave as the Indian lunar tryst was climaxing:

What does the success of Chandrayaan-1 mean to ISRO and the country?

It’s a turning point for ISRO. Of course, in the last few years we have seen very unique ones - the space capsule recovery experiment; the launching of 10 (small) satellites at a stretch; and now Chandrayaan-1. All this shows the maturity of our technology.

I think we have established (the fact) that our systems are globally competitive and we will be able to get a really good share of the global market, whether it is satellite building or launch vehicles.

We are also in the process of formulating the next phase of space vision for 2025. That is unfolding. We have been working on it for almost a year now.

The important elements in that are the human space flight, the recoverable and reusable launch system; hyperspectral (64-colour) imaging, microwave imaging and wide-band communication system. So this formulation should find better support from all quarters in the light of Chandrayaan-1. In addition, we have the responsibility of meeting day-to-day national needs.

In terms of business?

I’m sure it will reflect in business as well. You see, we already have two full satellites being built here. One of them (the W2M for Eutelsat) has been shifted and the second one (HYLAS for Avanti) will follow within a year. In launches also, we hope some more opportunities will come in the light of this event.

The Chandrayaan-1 trajectory was very tricky and the results are remarkably on the dot. We had practically no deviation in any phase of the mission. The first lunar injection came within 10 km of accuracy. To get this over 4 lakh km is really unique (for a first time shot).

Now people recognise that our launches are reliable and perform well. This will definitely build up the confidence of the customer.


Do you expect other agencies to increasingly seek to partner with ISRO? Or a smoother path to getting technologies that you need quickly?


Other space agencies are appreciative of a difficult feat achieved. But basically international cooperation will remain on space exploration and space science.

On the technology side, I’m afraid even today, competition is very stiff.

I don’t think we will get much benefit out of collaboration on that front. But we may be able to exchange our products and many sub-systems needed for satellites which could be sold in the international market. Similarly, we also would be looking at buying some things in the international market based on the strength of technology and cost-competitiveness.

What is the finance required for all these projects?

For the 11th Five-Year Plan (2007-12), we have projected a budget of around Rs 35,000 crore .We hope we will be fully supported.

Do you foresee the present global economic slump affecting the activities of ISRO and its customers?


These are high-end (areas) not affected by normal commercial events. Of course, the availability of funds can sometimes affect programmes. Our R&D is fully funded by the Government, which has normally been considerate with the space programme and not reduced the budget. We hope we will be able to maintain the pace of our growth.

Projects already committed should sustain for the next 2-3 years. By then the economic situation may improve. In fact, we expect Antrix to grow 25-30 per cent. (ISRO’s commercial arm Antrix Corporation had 2007-08 revenue of Rs 940 crore.)

Surprisingly, the Indian satellite market demand is quite high and the demand from our commercial channels continues to grow. We don’t have a single spare transponder - all are sold out!


These new missions also throw up a large hardware requirement in the coming years.

Indeed, our activities are multiplying and we are developing new technologies. We are talking of Rs 12,000 crore to be spent over the next six-seven years. A major chunk of this will be pumped into Indian industry. More than 60 per cent of our budget is spent on Indian industries. This policy will continue.

Has it been easy to find suitable vendors?

People already working for us have caught on with space quality. But if you ask me about the growth rate of the aerospace industry, it has not been as much as what we would have liked it to be. Big players like HAL, L&T, MTAR and Godrej have invested and are doing a major part our work. But to take on major space systems, perhaps other than HAL, the rest have not matured into that level of technology. But we will keep up the dialogue and enthuse them to take up more and more work load.

Why is it so – the Big Brother waits but the suppliers are missing?

The basic philosophy of our industry is that probably they are looking for quick returns. Whereas return on investments in a high-tech area like space will come later. You need to have patience and our industry may not be prepared to wait.

In the US and Europe, industries themselves invest in R&D, human capital and infrastructure. Here they don’t have a long-term vision to build themselves up. So the Government is forced to invest in many such areas.

How is the human mission plan progressing? Have you given a name to the Indian in space?

As for a name, we are going to declare this as a national competition for schools and select an appropriate name from among those entries.

The Space Commission has cleared the human mission and it’s being submitted to the Government. It is a multi-disciplinary task. We have to create simulation facilities first and then open up other disciplines. We are in dialogue with the Institute of Aviation Medicine (under the Ministry of Defence). It selects fighter pilots (- a process which has) so many elements common with training astronauts also. We will make use of their expertise. That is the reason for our selecting Bangalore as the site for the astronaut training centre.

Not only the physiology, psychological aspects also come into picture for meeting the environment in space.

How will require training overseas?

Training is one of the challenges. With this kind of facility it can all be totally done here. The centre should start working in about three years. In another two years we will start training the people.

The Russians and the Americans start with some 200 candidates and converge on four or five for the work [space trip]. We have to go through a similar process.

Are there partnership offers from NASA or Russians who have the experience?

At the moment there is no concrete proposal. However, we are in constant dialogue with them.

What is the status of your plan to send an orbiter to Mars?

We already have a projection for the Mars mission in the next five-year plan. We are in the process of selecting the scientific experiments and a formal proposal will follow. If everything goes all right, we should have that mission in 4-5 years.

How will the manpower requirement be met? With more recruitments?

The first year is over (for the batch of nearly 150) at the Indian Institute of Space Science & Technology at Thiruvananthapuram and the results are very good. That will feed half of the manpower needs for the future. For the remaining we still depend on the open market.

Our policy is to sub-contract to the maximum extent. We won’t be increasing more than 1,000-1,500 in the next five years across centres to replace retiring ones and for new recruits. That would be 300 scientists added each year on an average. On the business side, it’s separate for Antrix.

Many non-resident Indian scientists are said to have contacted you after chandrayaan-1.

I have not received a single request like that from anybody. I have come across many people who work in the same areas (overseas) but frankly, I don’t think they anywhere match the quality, knowledge base or the type of overall specialisation that we now have. Of course, if some bright ones do turn up, we would welcome them.

 

[nitesh]

Chandrayaan mission finds maiden application in weather forecasts- ET Cetera-News By Industry-News-The Economic Times

Chandrayaan mission finds maiden application in weather forecasts
19 Nov 2008, 1114 hrs IST, Chandra Ranganathan, ET Bureau


A few weeks back, Tamil Nadu government declared a holiday for all schools in Chennai fearing the heavy downpour that had been lashing the city for over 10 days would continue. Schools remained closed and students had a great time, playing outside with not a drop of rain falling on their heads. Yet another weather forecast had gone wrong.


Now contrast this to what happened at Sriharikota on October 22nd. India was about to launch its most prestigious mission to date- Chandrayaan. And it was raining heavily. But the footages from the control room showed scientists in a very relaxed mood. As it happened, it rained before and after the launch, but during the blast off at 6:22 am, there wasn't a single drop of rain.


ISRO chairman G Madhavan Nair, attributed this to weather modelling and forecasting techniques that the space agency had developed by using national and international scientific expertise.

"The weather all over the world is a mystery. I don't think anybody has deciphered it so far. But a team of scientists assembled here from various parts like ISRO, national aeronautics, lab, space physics lab, space application centre- they were running for the first time multiple simulation models based on fundamental physical principles. And these were assisted by observations we have from Kalpana spacecraft, Doppler weather radar developed by ISRO, and automatic weather stations and GPS atmospheric sounding equipment developed by ISRO. I can vouch for 48-hour weather prediction with 85% confidence level. And its 6-hour predictions are very precise. During the launch, everything went as per predictions." He added that ISRO would use this model for future launches.

Mr Nair said that ISRO is now in discussions with the Indian Meteorological Department to share some of these forecasting methods. "This is more relevant in the tropics. US and Europe already have well-established models for weather forecasting," he added.

"In this case, we created a model and ran software to predict weather for 6 hour, 12 hour intervals. Usually, the percentage of accuracy comes down with longer time lines. But, for the launch, we predicted weather for 48-hours with a confidence level of 85%. This could also go up to 72 hours in some models," said Mr Seshagiri Rao, deputy director- Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.

If this is widely used, it might come as bad news for students who prefer the playground to classrooms. But it could be a boon for people whose livelihood depends on accurate weather forecasts.

 

[nitesh]

domain-b.com : "Spot beam" satellite being developed for rural net connectivity: ISRO

"Spot beam" satellite being developed for rural net connectivity: ISRO news
19 November 2008

India is developing an unconventional satellite which will be designed to provide fast-track internet connectivity to rural masses and allow them to access advice on various aspects of agriculture, according to chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation, G Madhavan Nair.

"You know, if you take the country, even today more than 30,000 villages don't have proper connectivity. (With) conventional type of satellites, we cannot meet that requirement", he said. "So, we have to go for spot beams, high bandwidth type of capacity to be built up. Only that can make things happen", he said.

Aimed primarily at rural areas, the new INSAT-class, three tonne satellite, will not have an all-India beam, but spot beams instead which would cover different parts of the country. These would be controlled by a hub, which would be connected to the national network.

As for the satellite's applications, Nair, who is also secretary, department of Space, said "communication has to be established. Then, agricultural advice which needs to be given to farmers in various aspects...that would be provided through that (the satellite)".

The spacecraft would be launched by European space consortium, Arianespace, within two years, he added.

 

[nitesh]

The Hindu : Sci Tech : Chandrayaan-1: imaging moon in 64 colours

Chandrayaan-1: imaging moon in 64 colours

R. PRASAD

HySI will map the equatorial region during two 60-day slots in a year



http://www.thehindu.com/seta/2008/11/20/stories/chandrayaan1.pdf

If the Terrain Mapping Camera (TRC) can collect topographical data that will help compile a 3D lunar atlas with a 5 metre resolution, the Hyper-Spectral Imager (HySI) will enable the mineralogical mapping of the moon’s surface.

HySI, along with other instruments, will also help in understanding the composition of the moon’s interior.

Developed by the Ahmedabad based Space Applications Centre (the same Centre that developed the terrain mapping camera), the HySI will operate in the visible and near-infrared bands.

As a result, the HySI will be able to collect crucial colour information of the moon’s surface features.

The colour information is collected from 421 nanometre to 964 nanometre wavelength, with a spectral resolution better than 15 nanometres.

Captured in frames

Chandrayaan-1 goes around the moon in a north-south polar orbit. It will collect the sun’s light reflected from the moon’s surface in an area detector (frames). This is much the same as any ordinary camera that captures an image in the form of frames.

One frame will correspond to 40 km in the north-south direction and 20 km in the east-west direction.

The 20 km coverage is called the swath. The rectangular frame has 512 pixels arranged in a north-south direction and 256 pixels in the east-west.

Arrays of 512 pixels in a north-south direction can be considered as rows and the arrays of 256 pixels arranged in an east-west direction can be considered as columns.

Each pixel covers 80 metres (hence 256 pixels x 80 metres gives the 20 km swath in the east-west direction). The area covered in the north-south direction depends on for how long the HySI camera captures data. Hence more the duration, more the area covered.
Wedge filter

The reflected light falling on HySI is split into spectral bands of different wavelengths by a wedge filter. The filter is placed in such a manner that the spectral separation happens in a north-south direction.

Hence each of the 512 pixels arranged in the north-south direction will represent continuously differing spectral wavelengths.

“One end of the array will have 421 nanometre and the other end will have 964 nanometre wavelength,” said Dr. Kiran Kumar A.S., Deputy Director, Sensor Development Area, Space Applications Centre, Ahmedabad.

The pixels arranged in a particular row (256 pixels) in the east-west direction will collect information in the same spectral wavelength.

So in one instant the HySI camera picks up data in different wavelengths. Ideally, data collected by all the 512 rows will help in understanding the mineralogical composition better.

Data processing

But transmitting the voluminous data will be very challenging. “Onboard processing is done and only 64 spectral bands are transmitted,” said Dr. Kumar.

The data processing is done by combining the data from 8 continuous rows that will cover the same region on the moon at slightly different wavelengths into one data.

This kind of data compression allows the 512 rows of spectral wavelengths to be sent as 64 spectral bands.

“The data compression will result in some data loss,” Dr. Kumar remarked, “but we need to compromise a little as we have to take into account data storage and transfer,” Dr. Kumar said.

Operational time

Much like the Terrain Mapping Camera, The Hyper-Spectral Imager will be operational only for 20 minutes per orbit. This is because only the well illuminated regions of the moon near the equator will be imaged at any given point of time.

“So the imaging period will be restricted to 60 days in six months. We will have two slots of 60 days each in a year,” he said.


Area covered

The rate at which the moon will be imaged will be 1.4 km per second. Since the swath (east-west coverage) is fixed at 20 km, 100 seconds of continuous operation will cover an area of 140 km length and 20 km width.

In 20 minutes of operation per orbit, the area of moon covered will be 1,680 km in length and 20 km in width. The higher latitudes, which will not be well lit by the sun, will be covered be increasing the exposure time of the camera.

“We will be able to cover the entire moon in two years’ time,” Dr. Kumar said.

But why choose a wedge filter instead of a prism to split the incoming light into different spectral wavelengths? “We can get a compact system that weighs less only when a wedge filter is used. The complexity and weight increase when we use a prism,” he explained.

 

[nitesh]

Data bank

Data bank

R. RAMACHANDRAN

The Indian Space Science Data Centre will ingest, archive and disseminate payload data for all space science missions.


At the Spacecraft Control Centre of the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network, at Peenya in Bangalore.


A WEEK before the launch it looked like the most unlikely place to house the all-important Indian Space Science Data Centre (ISSDC) for the Chandrayaan-1 lunar orbiter mission. The ISSDC is intended to be, according to the website of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), “the primary data centre for the payload data archives of Indian space science missions”. This data centre will be responsible for the ingestion, archiving and dissemination of the payload data and related ancillary data for all space science missions.

The centre’s building, located next to the building on which stands the massive deep space antenna DSN-32 on the Indian Deep Space Network (IDSN) campus at Byalalu near Bangalore, was under construction and one wondered how it would be ready in time for the launch. Of course, the data from the 11 on-board experiments would start coming in only after the satellite reached the final lunar pole-to-pole orbit, which would be around November 15. Even then the ISSDC building was far from a state requiring only the final touches.

One had to make one’s way past piled-up stones, cement, tiles, bricks and water puddles, and construction workers who were busy obviously working against time. But inside the under-construction building, you were in for a surprise. It seemed that, given the fast-approaching launch schedule, it had become necessary to get the data infrastructure ready first and then the building shell around it. To turn around what is usual in construction business must have required some ingenuity on the part of the civil engineers and the building contractors.

To the right of what would eventually be the main entrance to the building is a corridor. To the left of that is a big hall housing massive computer systems and allied electronics. To the right of the corridor are several smaller rooms with scores of PCs at which people were busy poring over tables and graphs displayed on large desktop monitors. To the left of the main entrance is another huge hall with several video monitors, much like a satellite control room. It is indeed what one may call the instrument control room. Here were the computers for the principal investigators of the various experiments and their scientist-engineer teams to sit and monitor the performance of their respective instruments via both the video images on the monitors and the data streams in the computers on their desks once the spacecraft reached its designated final 100 km circumpolar orbit around the moon.

The downlink signal that will be received at the antenna control centre at Byalalu will be both in S-band and X-band. The former is meant for communications between the Spacecraft Control Centre (SCC) of the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) headquarters at Peenya in Bangalore for orbit control and housekeeping operations and the latter for data recorded by the on-board experiments. The signal received by DSN-32 (which is built in what is known as the Cassegrain configuration) is reflected on to a sub-reflector situated at the focus of the large 32-metre-diameter dish, which in turn reflects it towards the centre of the dish where there is an opening. From here the signal is carried by a waveguide – comprising a series of seven oval-shaped reflectors – into the antenna control room situated under the base of the antenna.

As L. Srinivasan, the head of operations at Byalalu, explained, the sixth mirror is what is known as dichroic mirror in honeycomb configuration, which is transparent to one band and reflects the other. This serves to separate the S- and X-band data streams by transmitting the higher frequency X-band through and reflecting the S-band. After separation, the X-band data will be reflected by the seventh mirror on to an antenna feed and digital down converter and then on to a series of cryo-cooled low-noise amplifiers (LNAs). The insides of these LNAs are maintained at sub-zero temperatures of 15 K (-258oC). Similarly, the S-band data will also be sent separately through the feed-down converter-LNA combination of devices.

K. MURALI KUMAR

The signal received by the 32-metre-diameter antenna is reflected onto a sub-reflector situated at the focus of the dish, which in turn reflects it towards the centre of the dish where there is an opening.


Both the unscrambled and amplified data streams are sent to the SCC (interview with S.K. Shivakumar, Director, ISTRAC, Frontline, November 21). Here a basic check is first done on the X-band or science data to ensure that it is in the expected format. This is then checked for quality by ensuring that it is “frame-synchronised”; that is to say the data received are proper and can, therefore, be used for further processing. The quality-assured data are sent directly to the ISSDC at Byalalu.

The science data received at the ISSDC will first be segregated into data streams for each payload. The segregated data will be processed to generate Level-0 and Level-1 data products at Byalalu itself for distribution to the various science users. Level-0 data are basically raw data. This level corresponds to converting the zeros and ones – the binary representation – of the data received to some basic format. For example, if the data correspond to some imagery, they will be converted to the corresponding pixel representation.

All the orbit-related and attitude data at the time of data gathering will be added on at Level-1 so that the exact satellite position is known for any corrections that may be required to be made to the basic data, according to Srinivasan. The Level-1 product is thus a gross product; a quick-look product, to which no corrections to any parameter – say, geometric corrections such as geographical or coordinate corrections because of the tilt of the camera or vibrations – have been made. These will be done at Level-2. Upwards of Level-3, products would be application-specific.

Raw payload data/Level-0 data and Level-1 data will be available at the ISSDC in the respective servers of different payloads. Through the different means of dissemination – Internet or dedicated links – that have been established for access to all users (Frontline, November 21), these will be transferred to the respective Payload Operations Centres (POCs) for further processing, analysis and generation of higher-level data products.

Each POC is co-located at the respective institutions of the Principal Investigators (PIs) of the various on-board experiments, which will generate the higher-level products depending upon their requirement and various applications. For such purposes the data may have to be band-separated because a particular application may depend on a particular frequency, say, visible or infra-red, which would be carried out at the user’s end, Srinivasan pointed out. The PI will also coordinate the science to be done with the data with other investigators in a given experiment, who could be from different institutions.

The higher-level data products generated by the POCs will be transferred to ISSDC archives for storage and dissemination. The data archives for Level-0 and higher products will be organised following the international Planetary Data System (PDS) standards. The ISSDC has been designed with a mindboggling storage capacity of 400 petabytes (400 x 1015) or 400 million billion bytes of data to be archived for 20 years, according to Bangararaju, a senior engineer associated with the IDSN.

An important part of the mission from the perspective of ISRO, the launch contractor of these payloads, is the availability of data from foreign experiments to Indian researchers. While the payloads CIXS (Chandrayaan-1 X-ray Spectrometer) and SARA (Sub-keV Atom Reflecting Analyser) have collaborating Indian institutions – the ISRO Satellite Centre (ISAC), Bangalore, and the Space Physics Laboratory (SPL), Thiruvananthapuram – and associated co-investigators, Indian researchers have apparently shown interest in data from other experiments as well.

After considerable negotiation, it has apparently been agreed to share raw and calibration data of each of the payloads. Accordingly, a nodal Indian investigator for each of the foreign payloads has been identified with whom the PIs of the non-Indian experiments will coordinate the sharing of these data. Of course, all the processed data from the six non-Indian experiments (except for CIXS and SARA) will be the property of the respective PIs.

 

[newlife]

Chinese media questions Chandrayaan's success

BEIJING: India's Chandrayaan mission may have evoked a good bit of national pride and come in for praise from different quarters worldwide including the White House in Washington. But a large section of the Chinese media has raised questions published articles questioning the success of Chandrayaan.

The articles question the contention of Indian Space Research Organisation, which said that Chandrayaan had an apogee of 37,800km with an orbital period of 73 hours. The articles in the Chinese media state that the apogee was only around 16,400 km with an orbital tour of 11 hours.

Most of the articles have been published in websites and blogs popular with the military and nationalist politicians. They include bulletin boards of websites that are linked to government organizations. But the general newspapers have refrained from taking a critical view of the Indian space mission. Most of them are copies of a single article.

The critical articles claim they were the result of analysis of data released by www.n2yo.com, which is a site devoted real time tracking of satellite launched across the world and contains a lot of technical information. Interestingly, the website of US government's National Aeronautics and Space Administration has published an article on Chandrayaan without raising any doubts about it.

Most of the articles are copies of a single piece using almost similar text. The headline common several of the pieces in different websites are: "Orbit not very normal; has India's Chandrayaan-1 run into problem?"

A search on the Chinese search engine, Baidu and the Chinese version of Google throws up several websites where the same article has been pasted. It seems someone or some agency has gone into a good deal of effort to ensure that the article is widely circulated across several media networks including those that represent government agencies.

Some of the Chinese sites also published Chinese versions of another English article, which described Chandrayaan mission as a case of major success in a country that has not been able to curb human rights violations and address the problem of poverty adequately. The source of this second article has not been clarified.

"Though India's human rights performance has been dismal in the last decade with right wing Hindu chauvinists targeting two large minorities of the country, Christians and Muslims but it has not hindered India's ascendance to the big league in the space," the version in the Chinese media said.


http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/China_doubts_Chandrayaan_success/rssarticleshow/3665791.cms

 

[Bushroda]

Chinese media questions Chandrayaan's success

Chinese media questions Chandrayaan's success-China-World-The Times of India

Its an old news. I think now they are all convinced that its a success.

 

[nitesh]

The Hindu : Front Page : Chandrayaan: normal operations soon

Chandrayaan: normal operations soon

A Correspondent

Only two more instruments to be made operational, says Madhavan Nair

Nedumbassery: Almost all the major steps with regard to the course of Chandrayaan-1, the Indian moon mission, are complete and it will switch over to normal operation in a short while, Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) G. Madhavan Nair has said.

He told press persons at the airport here on Saturday that only two more instruments aboard the craft had to be made operational and that might be done within a week.


“From there onwards, only some routine operations are left and everything is going according to the plans,” he said. The two science instruments of the U.S. aboard the spacecraft had become operational and they would start sending data within a week.

Mr. Nair said that with the terrain mapping camera of the Moon Impact Probe (MIP), stereoscopic pictures of the moon would be available, which, in turn, would help to have a better understanding of the height and shape of craters on the lunar surface.

“We are the only country to obtain pictures from such a closer distance. We have got pictures with a resolution of five metres followed by a Japanese probe which secured pictures only with a resolution of 10 metres,” he said.

On the ejection of the MIP from the space craft, he said the probe hit the lunar surface within 25 minutes and 10 seconds after leaving the mother craft and approached a crater named Shackleton. “During its fall from the lunar orbit, the instrument could take approach pictures of the crater,” he said.

Noting that the MIP was part of its technological demonstration, he said the previous missions around this region had not yielded the desired results.

Mr. Nair said the ISRO was planning to launch Chandrayaan-2 in 2012, a mission in which a robot would be sent to collect samples from the lunar surface and conduct tests. In 2015, it would conduct a spacewalk and the man mission to the Moon would be launched only after it. After completing the Chandrayaan series, the ISRO would be going in for a mission to Mars and the steps for it had started. A blueprint of this project was expected to be out only after four or five years, he added.

 

[Flintlock]