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Important Missions of ISRO - UPSC
Important Missions of ISRO - UPSC
Genesis
The space research activities were initiated in India under Dr. Vikram
Sarabhai, the founding father of the Indian space program, during the 1960s.
Since its inception, the Indian space program had three distinct elements
such as satellites for communication and remote sensing, the space
transportation system, and application programs.
The INCOSPAR (Indian National Committee for Space Research) was initiated
under the leadership of Dr. Sarabhai and Dr. Ramanathan.
During 1975-76, Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) was
conducted. It was hailed as ‘the largest sociological experiment in the world’.
It was followed by the ‘Kheda Communications Project (KCP)’, which worked
as a field laboratory for need-based and locale-specific program transmission
in the state of Gujarat State.
During this period, the first Indian spacecraft ‘Aryabhata’ was developed and
was launched using a Soviet Launcher. Another major landmark was the
development of the first launch vehicle SLV-3 with a capability to place 40 kg
in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), which had its first successful flight in 1980.
In the experimental phase during 80’s, Bhaskara-I & II missions were
pioneering steps in the remote sensing area whereas ‘Ariane Passenger
Payload Experiment (APPLE)’ became the forerunner for the future
communication satellite system.
During the operational phase in 90’s, major space infrastructure was created
under two broad classes: one for communication, broadcasting, and
meteorology through a multi-purpose Indian National Satellite System
(INSAT), and the other for Indian Remote Sensing Satellite (IRS) system. The
development and operationalization of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle
(PSLV) and the development of the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle
(GSLV) were significant achievements during this phase.
ISRO Milestones
The first Indian-made sounding rocket was the RH-75 (Rohini-75). It was
launched from TERLS in 1967. It weighed just 32 kg. Series of Rohini Sounding
Rockets were developed by ISRO for atmospheric and meteorological
studies.
The first Indian satellite, Aryabhata, was built by the ISRO and launched
with the help of the Soviet Union on 19th April 1975.
The year 1980 marked the launch of Rohini, which was the first satellite to
be successfully placed in orbit by SLV-3, an Indian made launch vehicle.
Subsequently with more efforts, two other rockets were developed by ISRO:
the PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) for placing satellites into polar
orbits and the GSLV (Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle) for placing
satellites into geostationary orbits.
Both the rockets have successfully launched several earth observation
and communication satellites for India as well as other countries.
ISRO launched its first INSAT satellite in 1982. It was a communication
satellite. It was named INSAT-1A, which failed in orbit. The next
communication satellite INSAT-1B was launched in 1983.
ISRO also launched the first IRS (remote-sensing satellite) in 1988.
ISRO launched its first lunar mission Chandrayaan I in 2008.
In January 2014, ISRO used an indigenously built cryogenic engine for a
GSLV-D5 launch of the GSAT-14 satellite making it one of the only six
countries in the world to develop a cryogenic technology.
It also launched the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) or the Mangalyaan in 2014.
With this, India became the first country to achieve success in putting a
satellite in Mars orbit in its maiden attempt and the fourth space agency and
the first space Asian agency to do so.
In 2017, ISRO created another world record by launching 104 satellites in a
single rocket. It launched its heaviest rocket yet, the Geosynchronous
Satellite Launch Vehicle-Mark III, and placed the GSAT 19 in orbit.
India launched Chandrayaan-2, its second lunar exploration mission after
Chandrayaan-1 on 22nd July 2019.
There are future plans for human spaceflight (Gaganyaan), interplanetary
probes, and a solar mission as well.
Background
The project began in 2007 with an agreement between India’s space agency
ISRO and Russia’s ROSCOSMOS for mutual cooperation.
However, the mission was postponed in January 2013 and rescheduled to
2016 as Russia was unable to develop the lander on time.
Later, after Russia’s withdrawal, India decided to develop the lunar mission
independently. Finally, on 22 July 2019, GSLV MK III M1 on its first operational
flight successfully launched Chandrayaan-2.
Once successful, India will become the fourth country to soft-land a
spacecraft on the Moon after the USSR, the USA, and China. Chandrayaan-2
will make a landing at a site where no earlier mission has gone, near the
south pole of the Moon.
Chandrayaan-2 is a natural sequel to Chandrayaan-1, an Orbiter mission
launched in October 2008.
Chandrayaan-1, ISRO’s first exploratory mission to the moon, was
designed to just orbit the Moon and make observations with instruments
onboard.
Chandrayaan-1 operated for 312 days as opposed to the intended two
years but the mission achieved 95% of its planned objectives.
1. lunar orbiter
2. Vikram lander (named after Vikram Sarabhai, the late father of India’s space
program)
3. lunar rover named Pragyan
Mission Objectives
Try and build on the evidence of water molecules shown by Chandrayaan-I
and study the extent and distribution of water on the Moon
Study topography, seismography, the composition of the lunar surface and
the lunar atmosphere
The study of ancient rocks and craters can offer indications of the origin
and evolution of the Moon.
The South Pole region of the Moon also contains clues to the fossil
records of the early solar system. Thus, it will improve our understanding
of the early solar system as well.
Map the lunar surface and prepare 3D maps of it.
Significance of Chandrayaan 2
In all the space missions, no country has ever attempted to land a spacecraft in
the polar regions of the moon. This gave India a lead in space exploration on an
international level.
1. Due to the moon’s axis, few regions on the South Pole always remains dark
especially the craters and have higher chances of containing water.
2. The craters might have never received sunlight because it at very low angles
in the Polar Regions and thus, increasing the chances of presence of ice on
such surfaces.
3. The lunar surface area at the south pole of the Moon that remains in shadow
is much larger than the North Pole thus making moon’s South Pole
interesting. This also increases the probability of the existence of water in
permanently shadowed areas around it.
4. The second de-orbiting manoeuvre for Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft was
performed successfully today on September 04, 2019, beginning at 0342 hrs
IST as planned, using the onboard propulsion system. The duration of the
manoeuvre was 9 seconds.
5. On October 14, 2019, Chandrayaan-2 detected the presence of Argon-40 in
the lunar exosphere.
6. On July 30th, 2020 Chandrayaan-2 imaged the Sarabhai Crater located on the
north-east quadrant of the moon
Geotail
Chandrayaan-2 named CLASS (Chandrayaan-2 Large Area Soft X-ray
Spectrometer) has detected charged particles present on the moon soil
during the orbiter’s passage through the “Geotail”.
This flight marked the first mission of PSLV-DL, a new variant of PSLV with two
strap-on motors. PSLV-C44 mission was unique as it was for the first time ISRO
used the last stage of the rocket as a platform to perform experiments in
space.
Significance
Applications
In India, radar imaging are used for crop estimation because our main crop
growing season of Kharif is in May-September when it rains and gets
cloudy.
We have used this data extensively for forestry, soil, land use, geology, and
during floods and cyclone.
Due to an all-weather seeing feature, the satellite becomes special for
security forces and disaster relief agencies.
GAGANYAAN MISSION
Gaganyaan is a mission by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to
send a three-member crew to space for a period of five to seven days by 2022.
The space mission was first announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in
2018 in his independence day address to the nation.
Ahead of the manned mission, ISRO plans to send two unmanned missions
to space as part of the Gaganyaan mission. The first unmanned mission was
scheduled to be sent in December 2020 and the second mission was
scheduled for June 2021.
However, the first unmanned mission has been delayed because of the
disruption in ISRO’s work and operations on account of the coronavirus
pandemic.
The Gaganyaan spacecraft will be placed in a low earth orbit (LEO) of 300-
400 kilometres.
The total programme cost is expected to be under Rs.10000 crore.
Gaganyaan is significant because it is the first indigenous mission that will
send Indian astronauts to space. If it succeeds, India will be the fourth
country to have sent a human to space, the other three being the US,
Russia, and China.
ISRO is developing the spacecraft and Russia is helping in the training of
the astronauts.
The spacecraft consists of a service module and a crew module, collectively
known as the Orbital Module. The launch vehicle used for this mission will be
the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle GSLV Mk III.
The three astronauts will leave for space in the crew module, which would
have a 3.7 m diameter and a height of 7 m.
The astronauts’ orange space suits were created by the Vikram Sarabhai
Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram.
The suit can hold one oxygen cylinder which will permit the astronauts to
breathe in space for an hour.
The manned mission will rotate around the earth every 90 minutes.
The astronauts will be able to see sunrise and sunset, see India from space
every 24 hours, and will also perform experiments on microgravity.
The spacecraft will take about 36 hours for the return journey and will land in
the Arabian Sea off the Gujarat coast.
In order to take this mission to fruition, ISRO has worked on crucial
technologies such as crew escape system, re-entry mission capability,
thermal protection system, crew module configuration, deceleration and
flotation system, and subsystems of life support systems.
She is half-humanoid and her body stops at the torso and has no legs. She is
capable of switching panel operations, performing Environment Control and
Life Support Systems (ECLSS) functions, conversations with the astronauts,
recognizing them, and solving their queries.
The humanoid can detect and give out warnings if the environment
changes within the cabin.
She will simulate the human functions required for space before real
astronauts take off before August 2022. She will be sent in a space capsule
around the end of 2020 or early 2021 to study how astronauts respond to
living outside earth in controlled zero-gravity conditions.
The humanoid has been developed by the ISRO Inertial Systems Unit,
Thiruvananthapuram.
ASTROSAT
It is the first dedicated Indian astronomy mission aimed at studying
celestial sources in X-ray, optical, and UV spectral bands simultaneously.
The payloads cover the energy bands of Ultraviolet (Near and Far), limited
optical and X-ray regime (0.3 keV to 100keV).
One of the unique features of the AstroSat mission is that it enables the
simultaneous multiwavelength observations of various astronomical
objects with a single satellite.
AstroSat with a lift-off mass of 1515 kg was launched on September 28, 2015,
into a 650 km orbit inclined at an angle of 6 deg to the equator by PSLV-C30
from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.
The minimum useful life of the AstroSat mission is expected to be 5 years.
It is seen as a smaller version of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.
It has 5 payloads which include:
Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (UVIT)
Large Area X-ray Proportional Counter (LAXPC)
Soft X-ray Telescope (SXT)
Cadmium Zinc Telluride Imager (CZTI)
Scanning Sky Monitor (SSM)
Due to the risks involved, payloads in earlier ISRO missions have largely
remained stationary in space; however, Aditya L1 will have some moving
components which increases the risks of collision.
Other issues are the super-hot temperatures and radiation in the solar
atmosphere. However, Aditya L1 will stay much farther away, and the heat is
not expected to be a major concern for the instruments onboard.
Importance
The evolution of every planet, including Earth and the exoplanets beyond the
Solar System, is governed by its parent star i.e the Sun in our case. Solar
weather and the environment affect the weather of the entire system.
Therefore, it is important to study the Sun.
Effects of Variation in Solar Weather System: Variations in this weather
can change the orbits of satellites or shorten their lives, interfere with or
damage onboard electronics, and cause power blackouts and other
disturbances on Earth.
Knowledge of solar events is key to understanding space weather.
To learn about and track Earth-directed storms, and to predict their impact,
continuous solar observations are needed.
Many of the instruments and their components for this mission are
being manufactured for the first time in the country.
forces of two large bodies are equal to the centrifugal force that is felt by a
third body
Lagrange Point 1
NISAR Mission
The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) is a joint Earth-observing
mission by NASA and ISRO. The mission aims at co-developing a dual-
frequency synthetic aperture radar on an Earth observation satellite.
The NASA-ISRO SAR mission will observe Earth and measure its changing
ecosystem and masses globally. It is the world’s most expensive imaging-
satellite and the two space agencies intend to launch the satellite by 2022.
The key factors and characteristics of the mission are given below:
Shukrayaan-1
Shukrayaan-1 is a proposed mission of Indian Space Research Organisation
(ISRO).
Venus
Venus is often described as the “twin sister” of the Earth because of the
similarities in size, mass, density, bulk composition, and gravity.
It is believed that both planets share a common origin, forming at the same
time out of a condensing nebulosity around 4.5 billion years ago.
Venus is around 30 percent closer to the Sun as compared to Earth
resulting in much higher solar flux.
XPoSat
The X-ray Polarimeter Satellite (XPoSat) is a planned space observatory to
study the polarization of cosmic X-rays. It is planned to be launched in 2021
and to provide a service time of at least five years.
It will study neutron stars, supernova remnants, pulsars and regions around
black holes.
Cartosat-3
ISRO has launched Cartosat-3 and 13 commercial nanosatellites into Sun
Synchronous orbit from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC), Sriharikota.
Cartosat-3 is an earth-observation remote sensing satellite that will replace
the Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) series. So far, ISRO has orbited 8 Cartosats
since 2005.
Remote sensing is the science of obtaining information about objects or
areas from a distance, typically from aircraft or satellites.
The 13 commercial nanosatellites are from the USA, which is the
first commercial order for New Space India Limited, the commercial arm of
ISRO which was formed in March 2019.
Inclination: It has been placed at 97.5 degrees to the equator of the earth.
It has many new technologies such as a highly agile or flexible camera; high-
speed data transmission, advanced computer system, etc.
Applications
Data from most of the Cartosat satellites are exclusively used by the armed
forces.
However, an existing policy allows only government and government
authorized agencies to access ISRO’s high-resolution imageries below a
resolution of 1 meter.
Cartosat-3’s optical imaging will also help to detect precise cartographic or
mapping activities.
The imageries are also used for urban and rural infrastructure planning,
coastal land use and regulation, utility management such as monitoring road
networks, water grids or distribution, creation of land use maps, disaster
management, etc.
Cartosat Satellites
It was developed in India by Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and its
commercial wing ANTRIX.
GSAT-30
ISRO has launched telecommunication satellite GSAT-30 into
a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) from Kourou launch base, French
Guiana by European Ariane-5 VA-251.
It was launched from the foreign launcher because it is much heavier than the
lifting capacity of its geostationary launch vehicle GSLV-MkII (It has the
capacity to lift 2500kg).
The GSLV-MkIII can lift up to 4,000 kg, but ISRO plans to use the upcoming
MkIIIs mainly for its first human space flight Gaganyaan of 2022.
Use:
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GEMINI
The Union Minister of Earth Sciences has recently launched the Gagan Enabled
Mariner’s Instrument for Navigation and Information (GEMINI) device.
The device will help to provide information related to disaster warnings when
fishermen move away from the coast beyond 10 to 12 kilometres.
The GEMINI device receives and transfers the data received from GAGAN
satellite/s to a mobile through Bluetooth communication. A mobile application
developed by INCOIS decodes and displays the information in nine regional
languages.