Tapan Misra named new head of Isro application centre

Scientist Tapan Misra Friday took over as director of the Indian space agency’s application centre at Ahmedabad in Gujarat. Misra, deputy director of microwave remote sensing area at the same centre, succeeded A.S. Kiran Kumar, who was made chairman of the state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) on January 14 in Bengaluru. An engineering graduate from Jadavpur University in Kolkata, Misra was the lead designer for the development of C-band synthetic aperture radar of the country’s radar imaging satellite-1 (Risat-1). “Under Misra’s leadership, critical technology elements for Risat were developed in partnership with the industry,” the space agency said in a statement. Misra contributed to the system design, simulation, integration and ground calibration of multi-frequency scanning microwave radiometer instrument, which is onboard the country’s Oceansat-1 satellite. “Misra was associated with the development of a special airborne radar system for disaster management during 2005-2006 Scatterometer payload of Oceansat-2, launched in 2009 for providing wind data to global meteorological community,” the statement recalled. Misra also led a team to develop futuristic remote sensing systems, including advanced radars, millimetre wave sounders and an advanced Scatterometer. Beginning his career at the applications centre as a digital hardware engineer for developing quick look display system of x-band side looking airborne radar in 1984, Misra went on to design and develop C-band airborne synthetic aperture radar. “Misra developed an important algorithm for real-time processing of synthetic aperture radar data when he was a guest scientist in the German Aerospace Agency in 1990,” the statement added. IANS