The Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology is a unit of the

Department of Atomic Energy The Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) (IAST: ''Paramāṇu Ūrjā Vibhāga'') is an Indian government department with headquarters in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. DAE was established in 1954 with Jawaharlal Nehru as its first minister and Homi ...

Government of India The Government of India (ISO 15919, ISO: Bhārata Sarakāra, legally the Union Government or Union of India or the Central Government) is the national authority of the Republic of India, located in South Asia, consisting of States and union t ...

, engaged in

research and development Research and development (R&D or R+D), known in some countries as OKB, experiment and design, is the set of innovative activities undertaken by corporations or governments in developing new services or products. R&D constitutes the first stage ...

(R&D) in non-

nuclear Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics * Nuclear space *Nuclear ...

front-line research areas of

lasers A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word ''laser'' originated as an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radi ...

particle accelerators A particle accelerator is a machine that uses electromagnetic fields to propel electric charge, charged particles to very high speeds and energies to contain them in well-defined particle beam, beams. Small accelerators are used for fundamental ...

and related technologies.

History

On 19 February 1984 the then

President of India The president of India (ISO 15919, ISO: ) is the head of state of the Republic of India. The president is the nominal head of the executive, the first citizen of the country, and the commander-in-chief, supreme commander of the Indian Armed ...

, Gyani Zail Singh, laid the foundation stone of the centre. Construction of laboratories and houses began in May 1984. In June 1986, the first batch of scientists from the

Bhabha Atomic Research Centre The Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) is India's premier nuclear research facility, headquartered in Trombay, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. It was founded by Homi Jehangir Bhabha as the Atomic Energy Establishment, Trombay (AEET) in January 1954 ...

(BARC), Mumbai, moved to RRCAT and scientific activities were started. Since then, the centre has rapidly grown into a premier institute for research and development in lasers, accelerators and their applications. Originally called the Centre for Advanced Technology, it was renamed by the Indian Prime Minister in December 2005 as Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology, after noted Indian physicist

Raja Ramanna Raja Ramanna (28 January 1925 – 24 September 2004) was an Indian nuclear physicist. He was the director of India and weapons of mass destruction, India's nuclear program in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which culminated in Smiling Buddha ...

Location

The centre is situated at the south-western end of the

Indore Indore (; ISO 15919, ISO: , ) is the largest and most populous Cities in India, city in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The commercial capital of the state, it has been declared as the List of cleanest cities in India, cleanest city of In ...

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (; ; ) is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal and the largest city is Indore, Indore. Other major cities includes Gwalior, Jabalpur, and Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, Sagar. Madhya Pradesh is the List of states and union te ...

. It is about 11 km from the Indore Railway station as well as the Indore airport. The nearest residential locality is Rajendra Nagar.

Research activities

RRCAT has developed two synchrotron radiation sources called "Indus": Indus-1 is a 450 MeV electron storage ring, whereas Indus-2 is a booster cum storage ring that can accelerate electrons from an injection energy of 550 MeV to 2.5 GeV. RRCAT also provides training to young scientists at BARC Training School located in its campus who later joined several DAE units like BARC Mumbai, IGCAR Kalpakkam, VECC Kolkata and RRCAT as Scientific Officers. It also provides a strong basis of front line research for external Ph.D. scholar in the related fields. RRCAT has also been actively involved in providing scientific and material assistance to the

CERN The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in Meyrin, western suburb of Gene ...

Propulsion technology

With the goal of launching astronauts to the

moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It Orbit of the Moon, orbits around Earth at Lunar distance, an average distance of (; about 30 times Earth diameter, Earth's diameter). The Moon rotation, rotates, with a rotation period (lunar ...

by 2040,

ISRO 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 ...

has started developing the strategy. Thirty tonnes of payload on rockets are anticipated to be carried on the trip. On September 4, 2024, Liquid Propulsion System Centre (LPSC) and Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology (RRCAT) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the development of

propulsion Propulsion is the generation of force by any combination of pushing or pulling to modify the translational motion of an object, which is typically a rigid body (or an articulated rigid body) but may also concern a fluid. The term is derived from ...

technology that can lift up to 30 tonnes and be conveniently transported to space and the moon. The duration for technology development has been established at eighteen to twenty-four months. The launch vehicle's engine will use

methane Methane ( , ) is a chemical compound with the chemical formula (one carbon atom bonded to four hydrogen atoms). It is a group-14 hydride, the simplest alkane, and the main constituent of natural gas. The abundance of methane on Earth makes ...

and

liquid oxygen Liquid oxygen, sometimes abbreviated as LOX or LOXygen, is a clear cyan liquid form of dioxygen . It was used as the oxidizer in the first liquid-fueled rocket invented in 1926 by Robert H. Goddard, an application which is ongoing. Physical ...

for propulsion. For engine development, RRCAT will make use of Laser Additive Manufacturing (LAM). According to Dr. V. Narayanan, the director of LPSC,

Next Generation Launch Vehicle The Next Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV) is a family of three-stage Reusable launch vehicle#Partially reusable launch systems, partially reusable Medium-lift launch vehicle, medium to super heavy-lift launch vehicle, currently under developmen ...

Soorya will require a minimum of 25 rocket engines; therefore, the current annual capacity of producing 2-3 engines will be upgraded. The physical construction of the engine will take eight years. The engine will be used to launch cargo into orbit initially. Subsequently, the engine will go through human-rated certification, enabling Indian astronauts to reach the moon.

References

External links

Official Website
{{Authority control Atomic Energy Commission of India Research institutes in Madhya Pradesh Homi Bhabha National Institute Education in Indore Science and technology in Indore Research institutes established in 1986 1986 establishments in Madhya Pradesh Institutes associated with CERN