The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is developing rubidium-based, high-precision atomic clocks for use in its next series of navigation satellites, ISRO Chairman A.S. Kiran Kumar said on Wednesday.
The ISRO is building the seven-satellite regional navigation constellation. The four that are up use European atomic clocks. These satellites, meant for civil and military uses, need to show the exact position and time of persons and objects on earth. So, they should keep extremely accurate time as they send signals.
The ISRO’s Space Applications Centre in Ahmedabad is developing prototypes of atomic clocks, along with the CSIR’s National Physical Laboratory in New Delhi, Dr. Kiran Kumar said on the sidelines of an event organised by the Metrology Society here.
“We still have to make qualified and flight-worthy versions. Our next generation navigation satellites will carry our own clocks” when they start replacing the IRNSS-1 series after their life of 10 years, he said. The IRNSS has commonly been called India’s own local ‘GPS.’
A senior scientist says the atomic clock figures among the top critical technologies to be developed indigenously.
Each navigation spacecraft carries an active and two stand-by clocks. The home-made ones need to be compact and fuel-efficient in space.
Dr. Kiran Kumar said the regional navigation fleet was expected to create many entrepreneurs and applications that would use position-based information.
The ISRO would drive navigation in the country with chipsets and other smart products.
A Hyderabad company was making a dongle-like tool that could be plugged to a laptop or a tablet PC.
