India too acquires capability to track objects in deep space

India has joined the league of select space-faring nations including the US, Japan, Russia and China, in terms of tracking and monitoring objects in deep space, as a prelude to Chandrayaan-1, Indian's first scientific mission to the moon.

India achieved this capability, leveraging the expertise of about 38 domestic companies including state-owned Electronics Corporation of India Ltd (ECIL), L&T and Godrej & Boyce, and Bhabha Atomic Research Centre.

A giant 32-metre diametre antenna, set up by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) at Byalalu, a little-known village in Karnataka, about 40 km from Bangalore, would not only help ISRO for providing tracking and command support for the Chandrayaan mission, but also help it in saving the huge costs it would have otherwise incurred in the absence of such an indigenous capability.

According to estimates, various international deep space network (DSN) centres charge about $20,000 for tracking objects for an hour in deep space, which is any distance beyond 100,000 km from Earth.

According to sources in ISRO, the DSN will provide tracking and command support for the proposed unmanned moon mission, scheduled for launch in mid-April from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, using the indigenous polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV).

The network using the giant antenna would send commands and receive telemetry signals including massive scientific data from the lunar spacecraft, about 385,000 km from the Earth, with a manoeuvring speed ranging from 0.01 milli degree per second to 0.4 degree per second.

"The DSN will be the base station for not only the lunar missions (Chandrayaan-I & II), but also for our future planetary exploration missions like Mars, which is about 60 million km away," S K Shivakumar, director of ISRO Telemetry Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) said.

The DSN has been established in a sprawling 135 acre campus, with an investment of Rs 100 crore. ISRO has taken into consideration various technical and international parameters including the seismic zone of the place, which is 833-metre above the sea level.

Shivakumar said that due to the state-of-the-art capabilities and inter-operable features, the DSN was also capable of tracking satellites of external space agencies, which can also be a source for revenue generation.

Indian Deepspace Network Campus (IDCN), as the campus would be known as, had also housed an 11-metre diameter antenna, which will complement the giant antenna wherever there is a need.

The campus will also house Indian Space Science Data Centre (ISSDC), to process scientific data that DSN will receive from the Chandrayaan spacecraft.

"ISSDC will be responsible for the reception, processing and archival of the data which could be helpful for the scientific and research communities," said Shivkumar.

ISRO Telemetry Network Control Centre located in Peenya, on the outskirts of Bangalore would operate both centres.

ISRO is going in for performance testing of the antennas, by tracking the deep space objects of the European Space Agency and America for which it is compatible.

Presently, NASA and the ESA are using 70 metre and 34 metre diametre antennas, whereas Russia is using 64 metre diametre antenna for receiving and sending signals to the deep space. China which recently sent a mission to the moon, is using 34 metre diametre antenna.