Muthayya Vanitha is an Indian electronics system

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

who has led projects on

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

s at the

Indian Space Research Organization The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO ) is India's national space agency, headquartered in Bengaluru, Karnataka. It serves as the principal research and development arm of the Department of Space (DoS), overseen by the Prime Minister o ...

. She was the project director of the

Chandrayaan-2 Chandrayaan-2 (; from Sanskrit: , "Moon" and , "craft, vehicle") is the second lunar exploration mission developed by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) after Chandrayaan-1. It consists of a lunar orbiter, the ''Vikram'' lunar l ...

lunar mission of the ISRO.

Early life and education

Vanitha is from

Chennai, India Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian censu ...

and originally trained as a design engineer. She completed her schooling in Boiler plant school Trichy. She graduated from College of Engineering, Guindy.

Career

Vanitha has worked at ISRO for over three decades. She joined the ISRO as a junior engineer working in various areas of hardware testing and development. She later succeeded to managerial positions, leading the Telemetry and Telecommand Divisions in the Digital Systems Group of

ISRO Satellite Centre The U R Rao Satellite Centre (URSC), formerly ISRO Satellite Centre (ISAC) () is an ISRO centre for the design, development, and construction of Indian satellites. It was established in 1972 as Indian Scientific Satellite Project (ISSP) in Pe ...

. She has also acted as deputy project director for several satellites including

Cartosat-1 Cartosat-1 (formerly IRS-P5) is a stereoscopic Earth observation satellite in a Sun-synchronous orbit, and the first one of the Cartosat series of satellites. The eleventh satellite of ISRO in Indian Remote Sensing Satellite (IRS) series. The ...

Oceansat-2 Oceansat-2 is the second Indian satellite built primarily for ocean applications. It was a part of the Indian Remote Sensing Programme satellite series. Oceansat-2 is an Indian satellite designed to provide service continuity for operational us ...

, and

Megha-Tropiques Megha-Tropiques was a satellite mission to study the water cycle in the tropical atmosphere in the context of climate change. A collaborative effort between Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and French Centre National d’Etudes Spatiale ...

, where she was responsible for data operations. Vanitha was also involved in the successful

Mangalyaan Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), unofficially known as ''Mangalyaan'' (Sanskrit: 'Mars', 'Craft, Vehicle'), is a space probe orbiting Mars since 24 September 2014. It was launched on 5 November 2013 by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO ...

mission to

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...

in 2013.

Chandrayaan-2

Vanitha was promoted from associate director to project director for ISRO's Chandrayaan-2 lunar mission. She is the first woman to lead an interplanterary mission at the ISRO. She is also the first woman project director at ISRO. Previous Chandrayaan-1 project director,

Mylswamy Annadurai Mylswamy Annadurai is an Indian scientist working as vice president for Tamil Nadu State Council for Science and Technology, Chairman, Board of Governors, National Design and Research Forum. He is often dubbed as the "Moon Man of India". Before ...

, who convinced her to take on the role, said that her data handling, team management and problem solving skills made her the ideal person for this position. Vanitha's responsibilities include ensuring complete oversight of the development and implementation of all systems and acting as a point of authority for the project. The launch successfully occurred on 22 July 2019. Unlike

Chandrayaan-1 Chandrayaan-1 (; from Sanskrit: , "Moon" and , "craft, vehicle") was the first Indian lunar probe under the Chandrayaan programme. It was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in October 2008, and operated until August 200 ...

, aimed to land a probe on the Moon surface rather than orbit around it.

Awards and honours

Vanitha received an award for Best Woman Scientist by the

Astronomical Society of India The Astronomical Society of India (ASI) is an Indian society of professional astronomers and other professionals from related disciplines. It was founded in 1972, with Vainu Bappu being the founder president of the society, and as of 2010 has a m ...

in 2006. She was also noted as one of five scientists to watch by

Nature Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the Ecosphere (planetary), ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the Scientific law, laws, elements and phenomenon, phenomena of the physic ...

in 2019.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Vanitha, Muthayya People from Chennai Living people Indian electronics engineers Indian women engineers 1964 births Indian Space Research Organisation people