Premier technology institute, Birla Institute of Technology (BIT)-Mesra, achieved another milestone by bagging a prestigious project called ‘RESPOND’ which is funded by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and aims to promote research and development activities in space sciences application. A letter confirming the decision of ISRO has been received by BIT, Mesra.
Notably, the ISRO has designed the programme through which financial support is provided for conducting research and development activities related to Space Science, Space Technology and Space Application to academia in India. In special cases research and development projects proposed by non-academic R & D laboratories can also be supported through this programme. The aim of RESPOND is to encourage quality research in areas of relevance to the Indian space programme.
“This only reinforces credibility of our institution as we bagged the project for which some of the prestigious institutions of India had also presented its paper,” said member of VlSI Design Group, Department of Electronics & Communication Engineering,BIT, Mesra, Vijay Nath.
The RESPOND Project - “Design of Ultra low Power CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semi-Conductor) temperature sensor for aerospace applications” will be of two –year duration. The project has been sanctioned after three years of rigorous five-round of screening of proposals related to space sciences application by domain experts in the Department of Space of the state owned space research agency. To the pleasure of the VlSI design group final approval was given on April 30.
“These types of activities are basically aimed at reducing India’s dependence on supply of critical component required in space technologies and related areas. This will help in commercializing IC designs in India by promoting the subject,” added Nath.
The two-year project will be funded in two parts— of the total Rs25-lakh for the project, BIT will get Rs18.55-lakh for meeting the first year expenditure of the project whereas remaining funds will be provided in the second year but only after producing audited account statements and fund utilization certificates. The premier institution based at Ranchi will need to produce Annual Progress Report to get sanction for the second year.
Among objectives of the RESPOND Programme is to establish strong links with academic institutions in the country to carry out research and developmental projects which are of relevance to space and derive useful outputs of such R&D to support ISRO programmes, aims to enhance academic base, generate human resources and infrastructure at the academic institutes to support the space programme.
The major activity of RESPOND is to provide support to research projects in wide range of topics in space technology, space science and applications areas to universities and institutions.