He has a hawk eye for snooping out talent. Dubbed as the "Moon Man of India", Dr Mylswamy Annadurai, former director of ISRO Satellite Centre, himself, has triggered most complex interplanetary missions and served in the directorial capacity of ISRO's multiple space programs starting from Chandrayaan-1 to the Mars Orbiter Mission, and to a major extent on Chandrayaan-2.
Honoured with a Padmasree, this plain-village-boy-turned-planet-hopping space scientist is not only an ace at precalculating probable hazards and obstacles with minute precision during interplanetary missions that might doom an exploration, but also raises a toast to his super intuition at identifying talents worthy of such high-end projects.
It was he who inspired Muthayya Vanitha to take up the project director's role in the Chandrayaan-2 mission despite her continued denials and unwillingness to accept the job. Result: Chandrayaan-2 is breaking the glass ceiling at every stage.
Excerpts from an exclusive interview:
Tell us about your educational background and how ISRO happened to you.
I did my primary education in a panchayat union school in my native village Kothavadi near Pollachi and high school in a Government school in Kinathikadavu. All along, my education was in Tamil medium. Then I went on to study B.E. in the Government College of Technology, Coimbatore, did ME from PSG College of Technology and PhD from Anna University.
After my studies, like most other guys do, I started looking for a government job, applied for ISRO and DAE. To my surprise, it was on the same day that I received an interview call from both. I preferred ISRO because it was closer home and appeared for it. I cracked it.
You have earned a nickname "Moon Man', although you have not only worked on the Moon but also on Mars. Did you harbour any planetary passion since your childhood?
Technically, I have one eye on the Moon, another on Mars, based on their proximity to us and matching our capability in reaching them. On a lighter vein, I am destined to be attracted by both the Moon and Mars as per my wife (she has some belief and knowledge in astrology). In fact, I am manglik with the influence of moon.
You have worked on diverse project profiles spanning from Chandrayaan-1 to Mars Orbital Mission to partially in Chandrayaan-2, apart from the several others. What was the level of multitasking and focus required of you as Program and Project Director to each of these projects?
During my school and college days, I used to spend long hours studying, but not the same subject. I read diverse subjects as well as newspapers other than my subject books. As per my mood, I used to chalk out a time table for myself.
Similarly at work also, I spent nearly 18 hours, but not stressing on the same work continuously. I divided my work in different slots and discharged each responsibility at a time. That's my working style. All with good focus on time management.
I believe in and am also somewhat good at delegating work. I spend time to study and understand my colleagues and identify their strengths. This enables me to assign tasks effectively. I focus on wherever it is required with a birds eye view so that the progress is smooth. This is my way of working.
What are the fundamental differences between the Chandrayaan-1, Mangalyaan and Chandrayaan-2 missions?
Chandrayaan -1 is the Orbiter around the Moon, technically a combination of our communication and remote sensing missions with an incremental improvement to take care of long-range communication which is nearly 10 times that of our communication satellites.
Mangalayan is the orbiter around Mars, technically similar to Chandrayaan-1 with incremental improvement in spacecraft autonomy and long-range communication to take care of longer communication delays due to the increased range from the earth and expected frequent communication outages.
Chandrayaan-2 uses the heritage of Chandrayaan-1 and Mangalyaan for all orbit transfers upto lunar polar orbit acquisition with the incremental addition of a soft lander and a six-wheeled lunar rover along with the science instruments for in-situ experiments on the lunar surface.
Where were the rover and the lander simulation trials done? How were the test beds created?
We created a proto-Lunar Terrain Test Facility (LTTF) at our satellite testing unit, ISITE, in Bengaluru. For recreating the terrain, we needed about 60-70 tonnes of soil. Geologists of various national agencies who came up to help without charging any fee had found few sites near Salem in Tamil Nadu that had the ‘anorthosite’ rock which somewhat matched with lunar soil in composition and features that was procured in the US Apollo 11 mission.
We got the soil from the Sithampoondi and Kunnamalai villages and professional crushers broke down the rocks and soil to granular sizes of 30 to 200 microns as specified by us. At the LTTF, we spread out the soil up to a height of about 2 metres, hired studios to illuminate the facility exactly as sunlight would play on the lunar terrain.
To test the rover we had to consider the weak lunar gravity which is about 16.5 percent of Earth’s. We reduced the weight of the rover using helium balloons. The lander Vikram with the rover inside it would land on the moon.
We tested the lander by creating a large test bed at our R&D campus at the Challakere Science City near Bengaluru.
Vikram’s array of sensors, called the Hazard Detection and Avoidance (HDA) system, is a critical part of the mission which would provide information like lander’s horizontal velocity, vertical velocity, height above moon’s surface, relative position of the lander with respect to the lunar topography, and hazard/safe zone around the landing site.
In the actual descent to the Moon, the lander will hover for a few seconds over a site and the sensors will assess whether the site is appropriate for the lander’s legs. If the spot is not safe, it will quickly rise and shift to a neighbouring spot and again assess if it is suitable to land on, all in seconds. We also created several artificial ‘lunar’ craters at the Challakere site.
We put a test bed of lander sensors in a small ISRO plane and flew it over the craters to see if the sensors could read the terrain and find the right landing spot. We conducted several other tests to clear the working of the lander’s propulsion system, its actuator and legs, and the rover’s movement.
How will information from the rover reach the ISRO control room?
The lander will act as relay between rover and the ground.
After Chandrayaan-1, what additional will Chandrayaan-2 search for on the moon?
Chandrayaan-1 discoveries were remote sensing from 100 km x 200 km polar orbits, whereas Chandrayaan-2 will have additional in-situ measurements of minerals and chemicals along with additional studies like lunar dust, lunar quakes, moon temperature etc.
Is Chandrayaan-2 powered with Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
Normally, the rover will work as per ground commands. However, if due to some reason while moving, it loses communication contact with the lander for a long duration, then it will retrace it's latest path and come back to safe place with to re-establish communication contact.
Similarly, if by some reason it gets into an orientation where it's solar panel is not illuminated by the sunlight, then it will re-orient itself to maximise solar power. AI techniques are used to understand such anomalies and resolve from them as I have mentioned.
Tell us, as you have closely observed, the working, passion and dedication of Ritu Karidhal Srivastava, Mission Director and Muthayya Vanitha, Project Director of Chandrayaan-2, who are steering this mission.
Both got their positions because of their own technical merits and potential to manage the respective teams of the Project (Vanitha M) and Mission (Ritu Karidhal).
Vanitha is an excellent engineer in Digital Electronics and has worked in almost all Remote Sensing missions of ISRO in various capacities and grown from an engineer to Group Director, Digital Systems Group before being inducted into the Chandrayaan-2 project as Associate Project Director in 2015.
In mid 2017 she was elevated to Project Director of Chandrayaan-2. She is good at design and problem solving in Digital Electronics. Her project management aspects earned her the Project Director's role. Though a bit hesitant to take this responsibility, once taken, she lived up to the expectations.
Ritu joined the Satellite Mission group of ISRO and worked in post-launch operations of many Remote Sensing missions. Seeing her quick learning capability in Satellite Mission aspects in terms of planning, operations and contingency management, she was given the responsibility of Deputy Operations Director of the Mangalyaan mission. Her performance in that mission earned her Mission Director responsibility of Chandrayaan-2.
I foresee a bright future for both of them.
What are the future high-voltage missions of ISRO? Is there a likelihood of landing on Mars or a manned Chandrayaan?
I foresee a moon sample return mission, a Mars lander mission post the planned Aditya mission for studying the Sun (this mission is already in project mode).
ISRO has near future plans of a Gaganyaan (sending Indian astronauts to space) and launching India's own space station. Your views on these two high profile missions.
Gaganyaan and the Space Station missions are the next logical extensions, as I foresee an eventual International Lunar Space Station, Lunar Colony which may serve as a possible out post for future manned Mars missions.
What prospects do you foresee for private players in India's space programs?
All routine satellite missions both for India and from other developing countries and as well as all routine launch systems like PSLV and GSLV hardwares could be realised by the Indian industries. Opportunities in post launch commercial operation also could be tapped by them.
What has been your major learning in ISRO?
Don't bask in the glory of present achievement. Keep moving on. Always look for the next opportunity. Be active.
And, if you encountered any failure in any mission how did you bounce back?
Accept the failure as a part of the game, own the responsibility. However, look for the lesson(s) from the failure, so that it corrects me for my future missions.
How do you envisage ISRO may pull India in the domain of space education?
ISRO was started to acquire cutting-edge space technologies for societal applications with focus on benefit for humankind.
Having launched more than 100 satellites in the areas of Remote Sensing (both land and ocean), Communication, Navigation, Meteorological to meet that objective, ISRO has now embarked on big science and technology missions like the Chandrayaan, Mangalyaan, Aditya, Gaganyaan, Reusable Launch Vehicles, Space Station etc.
To enable ISRO to focus on such R&Ds, production of standard parts for satellites and launch vehicles, including end-to-end integration are outsourced to both public and private industries.
For this there is a need for handholding them to train and qualify them for high quality space systems. This ISRO has meticulously planned and implemented. It means, while addressing the original objective of societal benefits, ISRO is also diversifying it's R&D missions in space science and technology by bringing in public & private partnership to increase it's space assets to match the developments and needs of the country.
(Kaushik Bhowmik is an information technology professional having interest in cyber security, artificial intelligence, space science as well as international politics and diplomacy.)
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