S Somanath, a senior rocket scientist, has been made the tenth head of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) and secretary of the division of space (DoS). He'll take over for K Sivan, who'll finish his contract, which includes a one-year extension, on January 14.
"The most important responsibility is to create a space enterprise in India where all stakeholders, including DoS, Isro, IN-SPACe, industry, and start-ups, are all part of the efforts to expand the space programme on a larger scale," Somanath, who is currently serving as director of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), told Sources This is the most important task."
He served as director of the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre for two and a half years before becoming director of the VSSC (LPSC). Somanath is credited with "energising development activities of the high thrust semi-cryogenic engine, conceiving a fast track hardware realisation and test programme, development of throttleable engines for the Chandrayaan-2 lander, and successful flight of an electric propulsion system in GSAT-9," among other accomplishments.
"...Another goal is to link the overall space programme with the government's vision, in which the Department of Space must truly become a facilitator of India's space sector expansion." This will be accomplished by the implementation of relevant legislation, framework, and norms," Somanath told .
Somanath received a B.Tech in mechanical engineering from TKM College of Engineering in Kollam and a gold medal for his master's degree in aerospace engineering from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), where he specialised in "structures, dynamics, and control."
He started at VSSC in 1985 and was a team leader for PSLV integration in the early stages. He oversaw mechanics, pyro systems, integration, and satellite launch service management as the PSLV project manager.
He joined the GSLV MkIII Project in 2003 as a deputy project director, responsible for overall vehicle design, mission design, structural design, and integration, according to Isro records, before becoming the project director of the GSLV Mk-III from June 2010 to 2014. On December 18, 2014, the first experimental flight of the CARE mission was successfully completed under his supervision.
He is an expert in the field of launch vehicle system engineering. "His contributions to PSLV and GSLV MkIII were in overall architecture, propulsion stages design, structural and structural dynamics designs, separation systems, vehicle integration and integration procedures development," according to VSSC.
He also led the LPSC group to successfully complete the event and qualification of the CE20 cryogenic engine and the C25 stage, which was successfully flown in the GSLV MkIII-D1 flight. "He also played a vital role in three successful GSLV missions using indigenous cryogenic stages and eleven successful PSLV missions using LPSC's liquid stages." The propulsion systems supplied by LPSC were also used to complete fifteen successful satellite flights," according to the overview.
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