Category: Space

  • Talk by Jaydeep Mukherjee on Space-Time Telescopes

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as http://parallelspirals.blogspot.com. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on December 09, 2010 as per the time stamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    Last week, it was my friend Srinivas who informed me that Jaydeep Mukherjee would be delivering a talk at Nehru Planetarium. I had missed his talk the last time although I had the chance to meet him at his home. The talk was held today at Nehru Centre. During his talk, Jaydeep dealt with some basic astrophysics, Einstein’s concept of Space-Time and about some of the current and future NASA-funded telescopes.

    After a brief introduction by Planetarium Directior Piyush Pandey on the Astronomy Lecture Series and Dr. Jaydeep Mukherjee, the talk began in earnest. He began with the Big Bang and corrected that the Big Bang was not really an explosion, a common misconception created by the terminology used. He stressed on the point again and again throughout his talk and also in the Question and Answer session. He talks about the first light from 400,000 years after the Big Bang when the stars first began to appear and right upto the present epoch. He uses images from Hubble to demonstrate that we look back into time using a telescope and so really these are time machines.

    He began the description of telescopes with the famous Hubble Space Telescope went on to the SWIFT telescope and WMAP. He then stayed a bit on Chandra X-Ray Telescope (perhaps because it was its 10th anniversary and Chandrasekhar’s birth centenary). He explained using two examples of a supernova remanant and a galaxy about how Chandra turned our understanding of the hidden mechanisms in these. For the supernova remnant, he selected the famous Crab Nebula which was seen as a supernovae in 1054 AD. His slide mentioned that the supernovae was seen by Chinese and European astronomers. Wikipedia says Arab instead of Europeans. He showed how observations from Chandra helped in understanding the remnant’s structure. For the galaxy, he took a recent example of a galactic cannibalism and explained how Chandra added another dimension to the picture and revealed the inner structure.

    He then moved on to the James Webb Space Telescope, the Hubble-successor as it is famously known as. He explained how the funding scenario in the United States of America meant that the Telescope would be further delayed than the 2014 year he mentioned on his slide. He also explained why there could be cost overruns in the mission. His analogy involved the house redecoration and how a new item found during the process could add to the cost as the process evolved.

    He then moved to space time and gave us a simplistic idea of what Space-Time was. He then followed it up with the Gravity Probe B mission. The mission wanted to try and test Einstein’s explanation of curving of space-time curve as gravity. They did this with very highly precise gyroscopes (which Jaydeep stressed took about 40 years in development) that tested narrow changes in angular position. This change in position would not be seen if we accept Newton’s concept of gravity. But, changing angles showed that Einstein’s explanation of gravity was correct. I have over-simplified it here for brevity. If you are curious, you can find out about this here.

    He then introduced us to a second mission, LISA. The idea behind LISA is to check for gravitational waves. To shorten, Jaydeep’s slide which compared electromagnetic and gravitational waves, gravitational waves move masses and electromagnetic waves move charges. LISA hopes to detect this movement in masses. This effect is so small that there needs to be three spacecrafts spaced a 5 million kms from each other in a triangular formation if there is to be hope of detecting these waves. In the Question and Answer session, Jaydeep agreed that this area was also small but was defined by modern technological capabilities rather than anything else.

    I enjoyed his talk thoroughly. In the Question and Answer session, a little girl on the same row as me asked an intelligent question: “How do you know that the light from the Sun travels to Earth in (approximately) 8 minutes and not in 6 or 7 minutes?” This question set a rather high bar of expectations for questions but I believe was not met by the adult members in the audience including me. Jaydeep had bought goodies from NASA (brochures on Chandra and what I think is a sort of NASA flag) which were for people who asked questions but the writer of this blog got one for just being there.

    The evening ended while we were expecting the news of the launch of SpaceX’s Falcon launch vehicle. I boarded the bus when the Abort was called and the Falcon lifted off when I got off the bus!

  • Terrestar-1: To provide internet connection to the not connected

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as http://parallelspirals.blogspot.com. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on December 07, 2010 as per the time stamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    The company that owns the communication satellite, Terrestar-1 went bankrupt this October. An organisation called A Human Right, which seeks to connect everyone and advocate internet connection as a basic human right, is considering buying this satellite.

    For this, they have launched a new website called – Buy This Satellite. Here, they advocate a 3-phase plan for acquiring this satellite. They are currently in phase 1, trying to raise $150,000. They have managed to raise $26,200 so far. This money will go into developing a business plan, getting a technical team together and ironing out the legal and business wrinkles.

    Interestingly, Suyash Tiwari, Director, Telecom Innovation Lab at Tata Consultancy Services is on board as an advisor for this project as well as for the organisation. This is an interesting Indian angle to the story.

    Eventually, their hopes are to establish the satellite into a place where it can provide Internet access to countries like Papua New Guinea or those in Africa that have not been connected to the Internet.

    Thanks to Keith Cowing for the hattip.

  • French President visits ISRO

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as http://parallelspirals.blogspot.com. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on December 06, 2010 as per the time stamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    Not many heads of state come and visit the high-tech labs within India’s space agency, ISRO. Perhaps the fact that the development of Megha-Tropiques and Saral were on, led the French President to visit the facility with First Lady Carla Bruni.

    ISRO Chairman Radhakrishnan’s opening remarks on how ISRO was helped in its propulsion systems technology by the French. He revealed that ISRO had signed a deal with ARIANESPACE to launch India’s GSAT-8 in 2011 and GSAT-10 in 2012. He revealed that perhaps INSAT-3D would also be launched using ARIANESPACE’s launch vehicle. INSAT-3D was to be launched on board a GSLV Mk-2. Perhaps it’s failure to launch this year has pushed launches of critical satellites into ARIANESPACE. The only major deal to have been signed is with EADS Astrium, for which ISRO had built the Eutelsat-W2M and HYLAS-1.

    The French President’s remarks seem to have been directed at a more general audience than in ISRO itself talking about the United Nations, Afghanistan and Nuclear and  education Co-operation.  Further into his speech he said two lines without elaborating much but which are interesting: “We will launch Indian satellites from Kourou, and European satellites from India. CNES and ISRO will develop a new research programme together.”

    India already uses Kourou to launch various of its satellites but no pure European commercial satellite has been launched by India. For now, PSLV may be able to afford Europe a cheaper flight option than perhaps EADS. In an earlier report, EADS had suggested this as a possibility. The French President did not confirm this, though. The second line is interesting because of the shape this new research programme will take.

    The other interesting statement from the French President’s speech is the “an unprecedented technological experiment that India is conducting to understand its population” reference. I am not aware of this experiment at all and have been trying to understand this reference.

  • India going to study the Sun

    This blog post was recovered from the Way Back Machine and may have existed on many avatars of the previous blogs that I owned. Some links are broken.

    Immediately after the successful launch of Chandrayaan-I, then ISRO Chairman Madhavan Nair announced Aditya-1, a spacecraft to study our Sun. Updates coming over the last one month have updates on this ISRO mission as well as interest in Solar Physics.

    Aditya-1 is a 100 kg spacecraft under development by ISRO in association with Udaipur Solar Observatory, Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Radio Astronomy Centre and National Centre for Radio Astrophysics. This Rs. 50 crores space based solar observatory will be in a 600 km low Earth orbit and is expected to fly in 2012 close to Solar Maxima.The spacecraft will

    Reports indicate that the Indian Institute of Astrophysics has completed the design of the solar coronagraph. ISRO is working on developing the detectors and thermal structure. First spacecraft prototype is expected in 2011. While the main idea is to study coronal mass ejections (CMEs), ISRO hopes to utilise the data to know how to better protect its satellite systems in orbit.

    The IIA is also involved in the development of a ground based solar observatory in the Himalayas with national and international mission. The fabrication of the telescope is expected to begin in 2010 with IIAp has already floated the tender.

  • NASA Space Policy conundrum and our Final Destination

    For months now, the fast moving US government (in comparison to the
    Indian government) has been debating about where NASA should take the
    US in the years to come. The expectation comes out of Obama’s
    comparison with John F Kennedy, who had given Nasa the mandate of
    putting a man on the Moon and returning him back safely.

    To think of a decadal or 4 year goal for Nasa is pretty stupid. Also,
    thinking in terms of Moon or Mars is VERY narrow and worse of all is
    wasting decades in setting a course.

    The Japanese example of their rise from World War II ruins and
    Columbus’ quest come to mind and in comparison colonising Moon and
    Mars look puny.

    To colonise the Solar System before this century is out… is more
    along the lines of NASA target I’m thinking of. Then set decadal goals
    and ensure Nasa reaches them.

    This post is applicable to my favourite space agency. (Hint: it’s not
    NASA) and I think that my fav agency is imperceptibly headed that way.

  • Getting Students Interested in LARS

    A key pre-requisite to starting a lunar simulation project is to have
    enough people interested in it. The Chandrayaan mission has piqued
    media interest in the Moon.

    However, people still look at it through mysterious eyes. People think
    Apollo 11 was a hoax. They don’t know that 12 people have gone to the
    Moon. Even the amateur astronomy community does not know of many lunar
    features on the Moon.

    Under such circumstances, it is useful to get students interested.
    Accordingly, we plan to unveil a series of events and mini projects to
    get things going. The announcements begin on October 4.

  • Lunar Analog Research Station – India

    My first knowledge of an analog research station was Arctic Mars
    Analog Station Expedition or AMASE. A thought process carried forward
    with Flashline Mars Analog Research station or FMARS. The Moon Miners
    Manifesto’s India Quarterly expanded on the theme and brought the
    subject of a similar station for the Moon in India at the backdrop of
    the Chandrayaan series of missions to the Moon.

    I became a member of the Moon Society this summer and have begun
    planing on what can eventually be a lunar research station in India.

    I am still reading through papers and worrying about geting people
    on-board before begining the actual effort. I’m also working out a
    simultaneous outreach and education effort that will focus on the
    Chandrayaan series and serve the project’s basis.

  • My Days at SEDS

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as https://pradx.org/blog. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on April 9, 2009 as per the permalink. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    In about a month or two, I will graduate from college and will head out to follow a career path that I hope will some day lead me to the door steps of ISRO. As one of the co-starters of SEDS in India, I thought you may be interested in sharing the journey of SEDS till date. My passion for outer space started way back when I was 13 years old and I have been smitten ever since. Despite the best efforts from several people, I have not been able to go off the path of space sciences. At age 17, sitting in an internet cafe, looking for a space organisation, the first one that came up was Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS).

    I was able to find several amateur astronomy clubs in India but none that were dedicated to space engineering. I learnt however that some did exist but I seemed to have been not patient enough to find them. I shared my concern on the forums of SEDS and there was able to meet several people who convinced me that I can be the right person to start the Indian extension of SEDS. While I remained non-commital, I was introduced to Abhishek Ray who seems to have found out about SEDS in the same way and had expressed the same interest.

    So, way back in late 2004 and early 2005, with a simple forums announcment, we got started with SEDS in India. We started off with perhaps 10 members or so. Even with such humble beginnings the dreams of two late teens clashed with what SEDS could be or do in India. We both felt that the ultimate thrill would be for ISRO to some day come to us looking for great leaders who could lead their projects and missions. What a thrill that would be!

    Things did get difficult from there on and we had a lean patch where SEDS was not doing much and we were mostly co-ordinating and working towards an international SEDS organisation than building anything here in India. Throughout this phase of SEDS in India, I would like to specially point to the help provided by Kirk Kittell, then a Vice Chair at SEDS USA.

    Enter Pranav Aggrawal and the chapter at Vellore Institute of Technology University. After failing with a two chapter model, we thought of putting all efforts into building one chapter properly that could then serve as an example for several other chapters across the country. By working on one chapter with effective results we thought that this could help people understand our work better and also aid forming chapters.

    With this intention most of 2007 and 2008 was spent building up the chapter of SEDS at VIT University. This was an era of several wonderful conversations and idea storms that I shared with Pranav Aggrawal and we are still a bit sad that we were not able to implement many of the ideas that we did have. Perhaps, the SEDS International Conference 2007 hosted by VIT University was the time that SEDS in India stepped up and did what several people still reminiscense as a wonderful conference.

    There, for perhaps the first time, we brought to India, the Moon Rover Design Competition and water rocket competitions. It was a great joy for us to the wonderful turnout that we had and the grand success that the event was.

    The event also got us attention to what SEDS was and as to the projects and events that we had done. At this point, we discovered that having a big successful chapter can also work in another way, to make new chapters worry about their success or failiure. In 2007, we began efforts to streamline the organisation, get it registered and to begin expanding to younger chapters.

    Several innovative solutions were brought to the table by the founding Executive Committee members (Anmol Sharma, Snehal Deshpande, Krishna Mohanty, Ashish Aggrawal being the chief among them) and several others who worked with and under us during the period. We developed solutions that would I think help us in the future as the organisation grows and spreads across India.

    An organisation that started with a dream has now got some very practical implementations for the way we work – the activities that we choose to do and the implementation of our projects. We hope we can continuously improve and be more effective than we have been.

    In 2009, Snehal Deshpande and Krishna Mohanty and others at the chapter in VITU, worked hard to bring to fruition the SEDS India National Conference (SINC 2009). Here too we brought the cansat competition for the first time in India, got all the small satellite developers from across India at a venue (thanks to ISRO  and specially, Dr. Raghava Murthy for this), math modelling etc. We hope to do much better in 2010. There are many projects already planned and several that we are still brainstorming. For the new chapters, I hope this is a great opportunity and for VIT, perhaps a caution that we have only covered a small distance in the vast ocean.

    To conclude, I would like to thank several people who have helped me in starting and getting SEDS up on its feet – Kirk Kittell, Pranav Aggrawal and Abhishek Ray. There have also been people that each of these individuals including me reached out to – brothers, friends, professors etc who have advised us and kept us going. I also hope that the future members of SEDS remember all these people who helped set up the organisation and worked hard to contribute to what it has become today.

    Thanks for being a part of this journey and I hope that while I hand over this mantle to the next generation they will take SEDS to great heights and perhaps one day even to another planet or even another star :).

  • Posting in the 100 Hours of Astronomy Blog

    I was asked by Mr. Manoj Pai (Secretary, CIAA) to make a blog contribution to the 100 Hours of Astronomy blog from India. I put up my first posting today. Do read it and let me know what you think. 

    I was thinking of a better title but didn’t get there. Enjoy it!

  • Spending the 100 Hours in India

    This blog post was first posted in the 100 Hours of Astronomy Blog. The content was recovered using Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine. I have posted the content here for purposes of keeping record.

    This is my first blog post here. I am Pradeep Mohandas, an amateur astronomer from India and also a member of SEDS. The International Year of Astronomy got me back to focus on my amateur astronomy work which was languishing because of several other space related activities that I was participating in and I’m always thankful for that. For my first post, I thought I should talk about the activities happening as part of 100 Hours of Astronomy in India.

    Most amateur astronomers in India were excited by the idea of an International Year for Astronomy when the International Astronomical Union presented this idea in 2003. When it was passed by the United Nations and became an event with support from the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), the excitement grew. Word spread immediately online – through the several mailing lists, newsletters, astronomy clubs initially. In the run up to IYA, prominent Indian newspapers (both English and regional language newspapers) carried extensive articles and spread the word among the non-astronomy community and I’m sure it reminded many people of their own brief stint with astronomy and perhaps even got some to try it out again.Towards the end of 2008 and early 2009, word spread faster through the net, via mailing lists, more press notes (especially from the Indian National Point of Contact – IUCAA) and groups like Astronomers without Borders and Sidewalk Astronomy.

    Even before the recent Chandrayaan launch, India has several crazy amateur astronomers who are very dedicated to astronomy. When I looked at online groups around my home in Mumbai in 2004, I found not one but several, who travelled to the outskirts of this city (40-60 Kms) to watch the night skies and follow their passions as amateurs. There were still smaller groups who went on their own, some looked from their building tops and from the online discussions in the groups I have been on, I think this is just scratching the surface when it comes to India. The timing of the 100 Hours is slightly unfortunate here in India, as it comes bang in the middle of exam season (yes, it is a season here), when students hardly venture out or are allowed to venture out of home in the constant desire for grades. But, still at the time of writing there were 29 events registered in India. This is likely to increase keeping in mind that Indians love to do things like registeration etc. at the last minute.

    Still, even with 29 events, another thing to look at is turn out. This is expected to be very high and our events are often described by various people as HUGE. I think we can wait for the reports at the end of the 100 Hours for more.

    Also, innovation is in the soul of the typical Indian amateur astronomer. This is more or less reflected in the events planned out for 100 Hours here in India. A group of amateurs from the state of Gujarat plan to celebrate “Sun Day” at the Modhera Sun Temple, a 11th century heritage site, popular with tourists. The amateurs here are also being supported by the Tourism Department of Gujarat. This is one of the few Sun Temples found here in India, the famous one being at Konark in Orissa.

    Another event is planned at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar, a 17th century Indian observatory. They will also project the webcast from the 80 observatories here. Another group will be doing a 100 Hours of Astronomy Van halting at various venues. At each halt they will put banners and posters on astronomy, put up a scope and show celestial objects, while playing famous movie songs on astronomy, moon and the stars. They also offer the songs as ringtones! The group also putting up exhibits of space crafts and astronomical philately.

    Many groups are also visiting the village panchayats and government schools to show villagers celestial objects through a scope, that they have never seen before. We could have done with more activities in public institutions like Planetariums and Observatories but the reported 7000 astronomy clubs are taking up the slack.  I hope you enjoyed this sampling of events from India. Best of luck with your own 10 Hours of Astronomy event!

    (Thanks to Mr. Manoj Pai, Secretary, CIAA for the details)