Andhra Pradesh, India: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Wednesday successfully launched four new satellites to increase its presence in space.
What made the event even more special is the fact that out of the four satellites that were launched from the Sriharikota spaceport, two have been built by students of IIT Kanpur and SRM University.
Heaviest amongst the satellites launched today is the 1,000 kg Megha-Tropiques satellite – a result of Indo-French collaboration – designed to study the water cycle and energy exchanges in the tropics.
The satellite will provide scientific data on contribution of the water cycle to the tropical atmosphere with information on condensed water in clouds, water vapour in the atmosphere, precipitation and evaporation.
According to ISRO, Megha-Tropiques with its circular orbit inclined 20 degree to the equator will enable climate research and also aid scientists seeking to refine weather prediction models.
India is the second nation in the world to launch such a space mission.
The French space agency Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) has built three instruments of Megha-Tropiques: SAPHIR, SCARAB and GPS-ROS. The fourth, MADRAS, is a joint effort of ISRO and CNES.
The three smaller satellites carried by the PSLV-C18 are the 10.9 kg SRMSAT built by the students of SRM University near Chennai, the three kg remote sensing satellite Jugnu from the Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur and the 28.7 kg VesselSat from LuxSpace of Luxembourg to locate ships on high seas.
Source: Times of India
