India and the SKA : current status, future plans

Objective of this workshop : To bring together scientific, technical and industry persons in the country involved and interested in SKA to take stock of the current status and plan for Indian participation in the construction phase of SKA.

Background : The Square Kilometre Array (SKA), the next generation radio telescope, is now in the final stages of its detailed design, and will move into the construction phase from second half of 2019 onward. India has made significant contributions during the design phase and we now need to firm up plans for participation in the construction phase. The SKA India Consortium has been coordinating this overall effort. In this context, there have been three SKA-related workshops in the past ASIs, which have proved very useful in bringing together the Indian community for participation in the SKA : ASI2014 (IISER, Mohali) where the various science working groups were formed, (b) ASI2015 (NCRA, Pune) where the SKA India consortium was formed, (c) ASI2018 (OU, Hyderabad) where the science requirements for the SKA and a science DPR were discussed.

During the last year, the India led TM Consortium has successfully completed the detailed design for the Telescope Manager work package. India has also been involved in design work for some other work packages. Main areas of participation in the construction phase have been identified : Telescope Manger, Low Frequency Aperture Array and Central Signal Processing in an expression of interest submitted to the SKA Office. Furthermore, a high level note was submitted to the DAE-DST coordination committee detailing what was achieved with the past SKA funding so far, and what is needed in the future for the Indian participation in the SKA project.

Rationale : This is a good time to take stock of the situation and chalk out the future directions. The aim of the workshop will be to discuss (a) technical capabilities and commitments of various Indian institutions and industries toward the SKA project; (b) the setting up of a regional resource center for SKA-related data; and (c) further sharpening of the Indian science case and the use of the uGMRT and other SKA pathfinder and precursor facilities by the Indian community. Needless to say, the path ahead is critically dependent on participation of Indian institutions (scientific and technical areas) and industries. A consolidated summary of this workshop will be forwarded to the DAE-DST committees which are involved in making decisions about further funding of the SKA project. In this sense, this workshop under the auspices of the ASI will be very significant in furthering the plans for involvement of the wider Indian community in the SKA.

Participants : It is expected that scientific and technical persons from different institutions who are already involved or interested in SKA related activities will attend this workshop.
Furthermore, we will invite industries who are involved or interested in the SKA activities to this workshop. The total number of participants are expected to be about 100.

Format of the meeting :We will have invited presentations relating to

• SKA-science,
• the current status of SKA and future plans
• the technical capabilities in institutes
• the technical capabilities in Indian industries
• resource development

There will also be a discussion and brainstorming session at the end for firming up the future plans.

Programme : click here

Participants : click here

Organizers of the Workshop : D Bhattacharya, K S Dwarakanath, Y Gupta, T Prabu,T
Roy Choudhury, Y Wadadekar