Friday, Jun 20, 2003
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Karnataka
By Our Staff Reporter
Dr. Aatre was inaugurating the Association of Consulting Civil Engineers (India) Annual Convention 2003 and a national seminar on "Smart materials, intelligent structures and systems in civil engineering". "Should India not have a share in the $100 billion market?" he asked. Discussions were being held with industry for setting up a centre for this technology. Dr. Aatre, who is also the Director-General of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), said the potential applications of smart technology could be in health monitoring, besides automotive and other industries. "There is enormous scope for application of this technology in any sector," he said. These materials include piezo-ceramic materials, shape memory alloys and controllable fluids such as electro-rheological (ER) and magneto-rheological (MR) fluids. These micro systems are mechanical elements such as cantilevers, diaphragms, and oscillating masses at micron-size levels, operated with electric power and highly advanced electronic controls. He said these systems were extremely small and could be used as efficient sensor and actuators. Smart materials and the MEMS together formed the backbone of the micro-system technology, which was expected to have a growing influence on every sphere of human endeavour in the coming years. In view of the importance of these systems and smart technology, the Centre had launched the National Programme on Smart Materials (NPSM) and the Development Initiative for Smart Aircraft Structure. Explaining the developments in this field, he said India was not lagging behind others. ``We missed the silicon revolution, the next big revolution is MEMS and it is an opportunity we cannot afford to miss," he said. The Structural Engineering Research Centre in Chennai was using fibre optic sensors to monitor the health of a flyover in Visakhapatnam.
Decision on Tejas
Dr. Aatre told presspersons that Tejas, the indigenous light combat aircraft, would break the sound barrier and fly at supersonic speed in two weeks. A final decision would be taken at the review meeting of the LCA project at the Aeronautical Development Agency, in a day or two. He said the next round of tests of the Indo-Russian supersonic cruise missile, Brahmos, would be held after the monsoon. Further tests on an advanced digital version of the pilotless target aircraft (PTA), Lakshya, would be held this year. The NPSM Director, A.R. Upadhya, said the DRDO would develop "smart vest" for health monitoring under the NPSM programme. The smart vest could check the heart condition or blood pressure of a person. It would have MEMS and other smart systems to diagnose various health parameters. He said the NPSM was sanctioning the project to the Bangalore-based Defence Bio-Engineering and Electromedical Laboratory (DEBEL) for developing the vest for the armed forces as well as for civilian use. The project mandate was for two years. M.S. Ramaswamy, national president, ACCE (I), was present. R. Jagadish, Chairman, Technical Committee, welcomed the gathering.
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