IIT Madras teams up with ISRO to set up centre of excellence

The Indian Institute of Technology Madras on Monday announced that it is collaborating with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to establish a centre of excellence (CoE) for research in fluid and thermal sciences.

ISRO will provide a seed funding of Rs 1.84 crore for establishing the centre, it said.

The CoE will be a nodal centre for launch vehicle and spacecraft-related thermal management research activities of ISRO. Thermal problems regarding design, analysis and testing of various components can be analysed by leveraging the know-how of the faculty.


Arvind Pattamatta, professor at the department of mechanical engineering, IIT Madras, said, “This Centre of Excellence will foster a unique industry-academia interface, allowing ISRO scientists and IIT Madras faculty and students to collaboratively advance research in critical areas of thermal science.”

He added, “By addressing complex thermal engineering challenges, we aim to contribute significantly to the nation’s space programme and strengthen India’s self-reliance in space technologies.”

ISRO and IIT Madras have had a long-standing partnership with the ISRO-IIT M Space Technology Cell, which was set up in 1985.

IIT Madras proposed to establish the CoE, which was then assessed by ISRO. It was found that the proposed facility can support ISRO’s research and development activities in studies related to spacecraft thermal management, cryo-tank thermodynamics studies and combustion instability in hybrid rockets, among other fields.