WHATS INSIDE?

Page 2
GRAVITATIONAL
WAVES

Page 3
NSSC EVENTS

Page 4
THE
HOLOGRAPHIC
UNIVERSE

Page 5
THE BIGGEST EYE
IN THE SKY: SKA

Page 6
OUR SPONSORS

Neutrino Detection: Challenges And Thrills

It has been often quoted Every
great physical theory starts as a
heresy and ends as a dogma.
Though the philosophical aspects
of the above argument are
immensely profound but it's
undeniable to the extent our rich
scientific history speaks of. Be it
Copernican theory or the
explanation of Foucault
pendulum, science has always
rendered people with an
insightful perspective into the
understanding of our own
universe.
To this seemingly endless quest
for knowledge, fortifies the
fundamental breakthroughs in
particle physics from the
discovery of electron to the
discovery of the famous Higgs
boson. Physicists have probed
deep into the intricate structure
of matter to reveal the secrets of
this incomprehensible design in
which we dwell. This motivation
has helped them discover scores
of exotic particles hovering in our
universe. And among them is the
very popular and elusive
neutrino predicted in 1930 by
Wolfgang Pauli which still
remains one of the most sought
after particles in the current
scientific research.
Neutrinos are weakly
interacting, electrically neutral
and ultralight elementary
particles with half integral spin.
Since neutrinos are neutral
particles and their properties
remain coherently similar to
their antiparticles: anti neutrino,
they are historically thought to
be Majorana particles, the
particles which have the same
anti particles. Neutrinos have
remained mysterious for
generations because of their very
weak interaction with normal
matter. Neutrinos can easily
travel through enormous
distance comparable to ten folds

of an astronomical unit through

water without being detected, so
weakly do they interact with the
ordinary matter. The concept of
neutrino was borne out as an
explanation to understand how
beta decay could conserve energy,
momentum and angular
momentum.
From what we know today, a
majority of the neutrinos floating
around were born around 15
billion years ago, soon after the
birth of the universe. Since then,
the universe has continuously
expanded and cooled, and
neutrinos have just kept on
going. Theoretically, there are
now so many neutrinos that they
constitute a cosmic background
radiation whose temperature is
1.9 degree Kelvin (-271.2 degree
Celsius). Other neutrinos are
constantly being produced from
nuclear power stations, particle
accelerators, nuclear bombs,
general atmospheric phenomena,
and during the births, collisions,
and deaths of stars, particularly
the explosions of supernovae.
During the past four decades or
so, tremendous amount of focus
has been laid upon building
technologically sophisticated
chambers and instruments to
detect neutrinos and we did have
success in detecting them though
in very small but significant
amounts. A practical method for
investigating neutrino masses
(that is, flavor oscillation) was
first suggested by Bruno
Pontecorvo in 1957 using an
analogy with the neutral kaon (a
nuclear particle) system; over the
subsequent 10 years he
developed the mathematical
formalism and the modern
formulation of vacuum
oscillations. Similar kind of
subsequent results were also
later shown by many research
groups working all around the

world.
Today, Japan has emerged out as
the forerunner in neutrino
physics at the global level. The
elegantly designed structures
like Super Kamiokande under
Mount Kamioka which obtained
the first evidence of neutrino
oscillation in 1998 have proven to
be of immense utility.

This mammoth structure is a

stainless steel tank that is 41.4
metres tall and 39.3 metres in
diameter holding 50000 tons of
ultrapure water. When
neutrinos interact with the
electrons or nuclei of water, they
produce charged particles which
can travel faster than the speed of
light in water. Such an event
generates a cone of light known
as the Cherenkov radiation
which is optically equivalent to a
sonic boom. The Cherenkov light
is projected as a ring on the wall
of the detector and recorded by
the photon multipliers. The
sharpness of the edge of the rings
can give indications about the
type of the particle.
Such detectors have been and are
being built all around the globe to
probe into the enigma
surrounding this elusive particle.
Dollars and cents are being
poured in and out to support the
international research groups in
their efforts to carry out
extensive studies and
experimentation on the detection
of such particles. The flame
within which burns our curiosity
to understand the universe will
surely open exotic dimensions
and illuminate our voyage.

The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success.

Gravitational waves are one the
greatest predictions of Einstein's
theory of general relativity. In
general relativity, gravitation is
explained through the curvature
of space-time. Massive objects
bend - and the curvature of
space-time tells objects how to
move. It is the influence of
curved space-time that we call
gravity..
What are gravitational
waves?
The most common way that is
used to describe gravity in the
picture proposed by Einstein is to
imagine spacetime as a stretched
rubber sheet. If we roll a table
tennis ball across the sheet it
would move in a straight line, just

Gravitational Waves
this can be considered as a
consequence of the conservation
of momentum.
Gravitational waves offer a
unique probe into some of the
most extreme systems in the
Universe. The y originate from
merging supermassive black
holes, from binary stars orbiting
at close to the speed of light, and
from the Big Bang itself. The
challenge in gravitational wave
astronomy is detecting the
waves, and then decoding the
signals to extract the information
they contain.
Sources of gravitational
waves:
Gravitational waves are created
by a wide range of phenomena,
each of which can teach us
something interesting about the
Universe.

like an object would travel in a

straight line in the absence of
gravity. Now, if we to put a
bowling ball in the middle of the
sheet, it would stretch. This is the
bending of spacetime due to
gravity. If we roll the table tennis
ball across the sheet again, it
would now follow a curved path.
It is attracted towards the
bowling ball because of its
gravity. When massive objects
move, the curvature of spacetime
must change to follow their new
positions. It takes time for
spacetime to react, as
information can only propagate
at the speed of light. There are
therefore ripples in spacetime,
just like there will be ripples on a
pond if you disturb its surface.
These ripples in spacetime are
gravitational waves.
A more familiar wave is
electromagnetic (EM) radiation
or light. EM waves are
oscillations of the electric and
magnetic fields, whilst
gravitational waves are
oscillations of spacetime. EM
waves are produced by
accelerating charges, whilst
gravitational waves are produced
by accelerating masses. For
gravitational waves we also need
an asymmetry in the system to
produce radiation, for example
we need a binary system and not
just a single non-spinning object;

Black hole mergers: One of the

ways that galaxies evolve is
through mergers. There is
evidence to suggest that a
supermassive black hole , a black
hole with a mass of over a million
times the mass of the Sun, lurks
at the center of most galaxies.
When two galaxies collide, the
SMBHs in their centers can also
spiral in together. The
gravitational radiation emitted
when they collide will be some of
the loudest events in the
Universe. More energy is emitted
as gravitational radiation from
one SMBH merger than as light
from all the stars in the visible
Universe.
Extreme-mass-ratio inspirals: In
the core of galaxies, compact
objects such as white dwarfs,
neutron stars or black holes, may
travel towards the SMBH at the
center of as a consequence of
scattering form other objects. If
they get close enough, they will
start to inspiral as their orbits
shrink due to the loss of energy
and angular momentum carried
away by gravitational waves.
These are known as extrememass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs) on
account of the huge difference in
mass between the SMBH and the
orbiting compact object. The
inspiral is slow, meaning that we
can observe gravitational waves
emitted over hundreds of
thousands of orbits. This allows
us to build up an immensely
detailed picture of the space-time

of the SMBH. These events would

allow us to do fundamental
physics by probing precisely the
strong gravitational field about
the SMBH, and, should we
observe enough, we will be able to
learn more about the stellar
systems in the center of galaxies.
The Big Bang: When the
Universe was very young it
underwent a period of very rapid
expansion. Tiny fluctuations in
space-time would have been
greatly stretched during this
period and could still exist today
as a background of gravitational
waves. This could be detected by
studying the polarization
patterns in the cosmic microwave
background (CMB). With current
instruments it is unlikely, but not
impossible that we will be able to
measure the background.
However, a right detection would
allow us to better understand the
mechanism that drove early
inflation of the Universe and
probe extremely high energy
physics. The gravitational wave
background would allow us to see
right back to the Big Bang, much
further than we can see using EM
radiation.
Galactic compact binaries::
Compact binaries are made up of
at least one white dwarf or
neutron star which orbits close to
other one. Such sources are so
common in the Galaxy that they
may begin to form a background

of noise.. The binary systems

slowly inspiral as gravitational
waves carry away energy and
momentum. Eventually the two
objects merge. Neutron starneutron star mergers are a
potential candidate for short
gamma rays bursts, one of the
most energetic processes in the
Universe.
Phase transitions: As the
Universe evolves from its early
state it goes through a number of
phase transitions which can be
associated with symmetry
breaking or decoupling of forces.
These transitions can create lead

to several different types of

gravitational radiation. imagine
cooling water so that it begins to
form ice. This is a phase
transition too. Ice startsto form
as small crystals that grow
outwards. The same can happen
in the Universe, small pockets
undergo the transition and these
expand out as a bubble. For
certain types of transitions,
gravitational waves would be
emitted when bubbles collide.
Detection of gravitational
waves:
So far, we only have indirect
evidence the existence for
gravitational waves. Whilst we
have not seen the waves
themselves, we have measured
the energy and angular
momentum they carry away. We
have observed a number of binary
pulsars. A pulsar is a neutron
star, a dead star that has
collapsed down to a very dense
state, that emits a period signal
(it is observed to pulse). These
signals are highly regular, in fact
pulsars are some of the best
clocks in nature, and this allows
extremely precise measurements
of their motion. Binary pulsars
are systems where a pulsar orbits
a companion, such as a white
dwarf or neutron star (even
another pulsar). We are lucky to
find such wonderful systems.

There is a global community of

scientists and engineers
currently working towards the
first direct detection of
gravitational waves. To visualise
the effect of a gravitational wave
passing imagine you have a ring
of particles lying in a plane. When
the wave passes through the ring
it is stretched and squeezed,
although the area enclosed
remains the same. Detectors
work by trying to measure the
differences in length across a
detector produced as a wave
passes. The fractional changes in
length are tiny, , so the
measurements are extremely
difficult. That is the same as
trying to measure the distance
from the Earth to the Sun to the
accuracy of the size of a hydrogen
atom !!!

BUILD.INNOVATE.ACHIEVE

EXHIBITIONS AND WORKSHOPS GUEST LECTURES

NSSC provides you with a unique opportunity to witness the various robots used Ajay Talwar is the most prolific
in the space missions by ISRO through an exhibition organized by Gridbots. We transient sky events photographer in
will also have an exhibition of astrophotography during our fest.
India.
The CanSat Satellite designing and launching workshop is one of its kind in India Dr. B.S. Acharya is an Indian scientist
aiming to equip basic embedded knowledge on satellite to engineering college working in the Department of High
students. The workshop will teach the basics of what a satellite is and how they can Energy Physics of the Tata Institute of
Fundamental Research. He will be
be designed using basics of electronics and micro-controller programming.
There will also be free workshops on Humanoid robots and Facial recognition. All delivering a lecture on the topic The
Universe viewed in Gamma Rays.
the workshops are certified.

HOVERPOD

Ever dreamt of being able to maneuver land and water with the same vehicle. If yes then this
event has been tailor-made for you.

CONVEYOR

Problem Statement: Design and Build a single stage water rocket which can be launched at any
angle with respect to the horizontal.

LIFT-OFF

Problem Statement: The team has to build a manually controlled, wireless, hovercraft
that has the capacity to move through a predefined path. The path would not entirely consist
of ground, but would have varied terrain, having potholes, water and other kinds of terrains
as specified in the arena below. The aim of the participant is to rake up the maximum points
to win the task.
The water rocketry challenge is a competition to build a rocket powered by pressurized water. The
competition focuses on designing aerodynamically better rockets that would be capable of targeted
flights when launched at a particular angle from the horizontal. The participants need to study the
basics of rocketry and come up with their own designs.

Can you imagine yourself going to an unknown planet and remedying the existing
operations with nothing but your trusted wireless robot?

Gone are those days when

people took 8 long years for
building a shuttle or telescope.
Innovation now days are just a
blink of an eye. And with the
new and improving modern
technology, building these
innovations are not at all
difficult. Scientists and
engineers now focus on
improving the efficiency and
design of the same. Hence,
National Students' Space
Challenge invites all the young mind to brainstorm to solve a similar
problem overnight.

DESIGNEER

Problem Statement: Participant have to give an optimized CAD

design of the given problem statement overnight. The exact problem
statement will be released just before the event. Some component of
CAD will be provided. Participant have to submit a design report on
their CAD to validate their design.

TROCHIA

With all the orbits almost packed with

satellites, it is high time that a satellite
capable of taking up more responsibilities
comes into the picture. . The satellite
should have the ability to move to lower
orbits for fixing shuttles, medium orbits
for monitoring weather and higher orbits
for the positioning. But this will not be
achieved unless the satellite is able to
change its orbit during motion. Hence, we
present you a challenge that will force you
to brainstorm in order to design and build
a robot capable of changing orbits by itself.
Problem Statement: The participants are required to design and
build a completely autonomous robot which can maneuver and
change its orbit around a given celestial body (an opaque obstacle) in
a minimum amount of time.

BUOYANT

Problem Statement: Build a manually controlled bot having an onboard camera,

which can be controlled from a remote location, using wired or wireless (preferred)
communication. The bot should be capable holding and putting small blocks which will
resemble broken rail pieces and resources in this case. During the course of the run,
participants have to do the task while looking into the input they get from the onboard
camera, the controller of the bot would not be allowed to look at the bot during the run
under any circumstances.

Problem Statement: The team has to build a

manually controlled rover which can traverse the
Maze, a 3-dimensional underwater space-simulated
tunnel completing several tasks in least possible
time. . It should have a picking mechanism attached
as well which will be used in completing some tasks.
The bot has to change its depth for successful
transport of the payload. The path may have floating
obstacles that might partially obstruct the path of
the rover and the robot has to avoid those obstacles
by appropriate changes in orientation and position.
Problem Statement: Your
team has to give a proposal
for dealing with energy crisis
by harnessing energy from
space. You can propose to
build or devise new
equipment or suggest
modifications in methods
which are already available.
The proposal should include
exact construction details, feasibility, technology,
timeline and cost of your endeavor.

NATIONAL STUDENTS SPACE CHALLENGE '14

The Moonwalk

E-SPACE

31st Oct2nd Nov

Reason, observation, and experience; the holy trinity of science

theory explicably conforms
the conjecture of 4-D Hyper
Black Hole our 3-D universe
might have spawned from,
a possible forthright
explanation of homogenous and
isotropic characteristic of
visible universe tuning up with
analogy of expanding balloon
universe paradigm with no
center of expansion.
A homology for
dummies to make it even
clearer can be excerpted from
balancing acts performed in
circuses. For an actor the path
line (the rope) as he perceives
would be one dimensional
while walking on it, now
consider the microorganisms
living within the rope invisible
to our naked eyes would see the
same rope as 2-D surface to
walk on or a 3-D warehouse to
roam or poop into (a little pun ).
David Bohme is not the
only researcher who has found
the evidence that the universe
is a Hologram. Working
independently in the field of
brain research, Stanford
neurophysiologist, Karl
Pribram too queued in pursuit
of answers though holographic
hypothesis which somehow
atoned with the erratic
behavior and working of brain.
Pribram discovered that
information stored within the
brain behaved in frantic
manner and were never stored
at any specific spot pertaining
to how brain too emulated
hologram working
astoundingly. Further, the
experiments with mice's brain
showed staggering results, no
matter in what ways its brain
was mutilated it always
seemed to remember
everything, the memory could
never be eradicated completely
as if it was dispensed to every
brain part. Or it could be as
holographic hypothesis
suggests, even the fraction of
the brain is working as a whole
just like a Hologram.
N u m e r o u s
researchers, including Bohme
and Pribram, have noted that
many para-psychological
phenomena became much more
understandable in terms of the
Holographic paradigm. Thus
Holographic science has let
many scientists solve some of
the unsolved puzzles in
psychology offering model of
understanding many baffling
phenomena around.

The Holographic Universe

Before Einstein, mankind

perceived the world molded
around into 3 dimensional
shaped objects and it was
afterwards when Einstein set
forth time as an extra
dimension eliciting the
pedagogical transformation,
for now (the) world time was
not just ticking hands stuck
onto the walls but what
exorbitantly appeared in
c a l c u l a t i o n s t o o .
But the concept of four
dimensions didn't seem to
accomplish the job of uniting
Einsteinium dynamics with the
Quantum world. It was then
the string theory came into
picture which fostered
scientific thinking with the
idea of another 7 dimensions.
Even after so much progress
and development in the field of
theoretical physics, things
didn't seem to tune up with
Alain Aspect's experiment
conducted with electrons which
seemed to communicate with
each other instantaneously
regardless of the distance
separating them, be it 10 feet or
10 billion miles apart.
Somehow each particle always
seems to know what the other is
doing. Many scientists were
seeing new facets of science
through Aspect's experiment
with the potential to establish a
new order and revolutionize
the modern day physics. B u t
the real feat of the
experimental observations
crept in with the violation of
Einstein's long held tenetcosmological speed limit i.e.
nothing in this universe can
travel faster than speed of
light.

Bohme, more radical

explanations had to
come as a conclusive
proof of the Aspect's
f i n d i n g s .
The results were
tantamount to behavior of a
hologram where universe
rather comes out of the picture
in an even more intricate form
when talked in terms of
dimensions, be it spatial or
temporal. As Bohme expressed
in his words-"Aspect's findings
imply that objective reality
does not exist, that despite its
apparent solidity the universe
is at heart a phantasm, a
gigantic and splendidly
detailed Hologram ".
A hologram as peculiar in
behavior is indivisible; every
piece cut still carries
information of whole image.
This goes down with same
behavior even when cut
further. Conclusively every
minute segment is a whole
hologram in itself bearing
information of every other
segment. Universe could just
be behaving in a similar
manner according to Bohme.
To illustrate Aspect's
findings a fish aquarium sets
out as a paradigm, as when
watched from two different
sides same fish appears
differently. In a very similar
way the behavior of two
electrons in the experiment
could be restated in a manner
that the electrons behaving

Aspect's findings were

questioning the very
foundation of science and
centuries of physics seemed to
be shredding
down to
pieces. Somehow scientists had
to come up with explanations to
offer support to the
observations, but to some, like

THE SLIDING SPRING COMET

s i m u l t a n e o u s l y
communicating with each other
regardless of the distance
separating them could be just a
single entity.
Of several scientific
explanations burgeoned to offer
credence, the theory of the very
existence of our 3 D universe
on a gigantic 4-D Black Hole
seemed more creditable. The
exposition of the conundrum
roots from the notorious Black
Hole information paradox. As
we are familiar with an adage
on black holes, every
astrophysical article mentions
Nothing can escape from
black hole's intense gravity, not
even light, if it were true then
a general conclusion comes
forth as -if nothing really
escapes black holes then
conclusively all the information
must be getting lost
somewhere. Here is how
paradox comes into picture
defying the universal massenergy consistency law.
However, the theory of
holographic universe could
successfully explain the
paradox in perspective that
information is never lost into
black hole's inescapable gravity
instead gets embedded on its
surface patching up all over its
surfaces in 2-D information
form.
Getting back from
where we started overviewing
over the explanation so far, it
turns out that information in
3D form once sucked into black
holes get embedded onto its
surface in 2 dimension. This

is a part of the Oort cloud, a mass of icy comets at the furthest reaches
of our solar system. It's going to fly by Mars at a mind blowing speed of about 56 kmph on Monday at 5.27am (Australian time). In fact, it'll
pass Mars at a distance of 139,500 kilometers - just one third of the distance from here to the Moon. That's much, much closer than any comet
has ever flown by Earth that we know of. These Oort cloud comets are extremely rare, and astronomers are keen to find out more about them.
Luckily, our Mars rovers and orbiters will be watching the fly-by closely - along with the Hubble Space Telescope and hundreds of other
instruments on Earth.Theres no danger to Curiosity on the surface of Mars as the rover is protected by the planets thin atmosphere.
However, theres the small chance that the dust and debris from the comets tail will damage the spacecraft orbiting Mars, such as Maven and
India's Mangalyaan. NASA is now "taking steps to protect is Mars orbiters, while preserving opportunities to gather valuable scientfic data".

The Moonwalk

Reality leaves a lot to the imagination

th

be completed till 2016. The

THE BIGGEST EYE ON THE SKY: SKA Telescope
Manager (TM)

On August the 11 , 2014,

India's National Centre for
Radio Astrophysics (NCRA)
became the 11th full member of
the Square Kilometer Array
(SKA) radio-telescope project.
The SKA is being designed and
developed as the state-of-the-art
International facility to conduct
five to six main science projects
which will answer the
fundamental questions
regarding our Universe.
The data from the SKA will be
used to answer several of the
most critical questions in
various fields like Astrophysics,
Cosmology and particle
Astrophysics. By picking up
radio waves emitted in the most
extreme conditions of the
Universe, the SKA will be
helpful in deciphering the
unknowns like Epoch of
Reionization (EoR), First metals
and galaxies, Dark Energy,
Cosmic magnetism,
Gravitational waves, Theories of
gravity, Earthlike exo-planets
and intelligent alien life. This
concise list of scientific
applications gives a glimpse of
the vast spread of research
subjects the SKA will address.
The SKA is the most advanced
radio telescope ever
conceptualized. As the name
suggests, the area of the dishes
of SKA that will collect radio
waves from outer space will add
up to a large expanse of 1 square
kilometer. The SKA will make
use of design techniques
developed over last half-acentury. 'Aperture synthesis' is
the most useful design concept
being utilized. The SKA is a
radio interferometer where
voltages induced at each
antenna by the electromagnetic
waves coming from cosmic radio
sources are combined to produce
a map of the radio sky. The large
number of antennae results in
improved sensitivity of the
telescope. The effective
synthesized aperture size of the
SKA will be up to a mammoth
one million square meters!
Most modern radio telescopes
have a resolution in arc minutes
to arc seconds. For example,
India's Giant Metrewave Radio
Telescope (GMRT), has the
highest resolution of about 2
arcseconds and 20 arcseconds at
1420 and 150 MHz respectively.
The Very Large Array (VLA) of
the US has a highest resolution
that is in the range of 0.045
arcseconds and 24.0 arcseconds
at 45 GHz and 74 MHz
respectively. The SKA's
resolution is a function of the
Field Of View (FOV) being used.
For an observing area of 1 square
degree, a resolution of 0.1
arcseconds can be achieved and
for an observing area of 200
square degrees, the resolution is

0.2 arcseconds.
The SKA is planned to be built in
two parts, one in the state of
western Australia and the other
in Karoo region of central South
Africa which are radio quiet
zones.
In the first phase, 3

will attract a cost of 1.5 billion.

Till the first phase of SKA is
completed, the next generation
of optical telescopes such as the
European Extremely Large
Telescope and the Thirty meter
Telescope will have come up.

different types of receivers will

b e
b u i l t .
1. SKA-Low: A low frequency
aperture array consisting of
many thousands of dipoles. This
receiver has no moving parts.
2. SKA-Mid: A mid-frequency
array of steerable dishes, each 15
m
i n
d i a m e t e r .
3. SKA-Survey: A multi-pixel
phased array feed will be placed
on many dishes which will be
capable of mid-frequency
observations over a large area of
sky at once. This receiver will
primarily be used for large area
sky surveys.
SKA-Low and SKA-Survey will
be built in Australia. In Phase 2,
a dense aperture array system
w i l l
b e
a d d e d .

These will complement the SKA

in the optical region.
Given the high cost ,technical
complexity in designing and the
engineering challenges in
building it, the SKA needs a joint
International effort. This
International effort is
coordinated by the SKA
Organisation, a not-for-profit
company located in Manchester,
UK. It is joined by 11 countries :
Canada, Italy, China, Germany,
New Zealand, South Africa,
Sweden, The Netherlands, The
UK and most recently joined by
India's NCRA-TIFR. Many
institutes from India are
interested in participating in the
project including partners from
Indian Industries. The NCRA TIFR and the Raman Research
Institute (RRI) are leading the
Indian participation.
Indian entities like the NCRA
have done a lot of work in the
field of radio telescope design
and construction and gained
expertise over a period of time by
constructing, operating and
upgrading major facilities like
the Ooty Radio Telescope and
the GMRT. During the concept
design phase of the SKA (200712), NCRA astronomers and
engineers have successfully
carried out the Concept Design
Review of a state of the art
control and monitoring system
for this extremely complex
instrument. Using its expertise,
NCRA is now leading an
International consortium of 7
countries that has taken up the
work of design and development
of Telescope Manager which will

The SKA Phase 1 construction is

expected to begin in 2017, and
complete in 2022 at a cost of 400
million Euro. The full SKA
construction (from 2022 to 2027)

Amazing facts about the

SKA:
v The SKA Data Processing
Unit will run with the
processing power of 100
million personal
computers.
v The net data generated by
SKA will be 10 times the
data transferred on the
entire Internet as of 2014.
v The SKA will use enough
optical fibre to wrap twice
around the earth...
v The aperture arrays in
the SKA could produce
more than 100 times the
global internet traffic.

subsystem is a version of the

monitoring and control system
and it will act like the brain and
nervous system of the
instrument. The TM Consortium
is led by Professor Yashwant
Gupta of the NCRA in Pune,
India. Dr. Yogesh Wadadekar,
NCRA Faculty member is the
Project Scientist of the
Consortium. The Tata Research
Design and Development Centre
of TCS is one of the major Indian
partners of NCRA in the TM
Consortium. In addition, NCRA
and its Indian partners are also
participating in other
subsystems of the SKA like the
Central Signal Processor,
Signal and Data Transport etc.
The returns to SKA project
participation of India are
invaluable and will help
extensively in the development
science and technology field.
Scientists from many astronomy
research institutes, IISERS,
IITs and some of the universities
are keenly interested for
participation in scientific and
technical activities related to the
SKA. It will allow Indian
astronomers to take up cutting
edge research with the SKA. It
will also drive the development
of new technologies in India that
will be of benefit to the nation's
astronomy community. It will
also provide significant
opportunities for growth and
technology innovation to Indian
industry.
To summarize, the SKA will
provide information on an
unprecedented scale. This will
help answer many fundamental
questions about the Universe
and certainly create many more
questions as well. In the next
decade, Astronomy and
Astrophysics are set to be
revolutionized by this big boss of
all telescopes.
In many ways, SKA's scope is
like a large particle physics
facility such as CERN with very
long term goals and wide
participation from member
countries. NCRA, with its vast
experience and expertise in radioastronomy, has been associated
with the SKA project since its
conception, and holds a Full
Membership position in the SKA
Organisation at present. In fact,
NCRA's perspective has been to
concentrate on areas and topics
where there is direct and good
synergy with possible
improvements at the GMRT.
There is already strong interest
and vigorous activity in India in
the research areas constituting
the two main science drivers
identified for SKA : pulsars and
the Epoch of Reionization.
-Prof. Yashwant Gupta

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