Objective of the workshop: To bring together the researchers and engineers from academia and industry for participation in the construction, commissioning, and science of SKA.
Background: The SKA Observatory (SKAO) has commenced the construction of two SKA telescopes in Australia and South Africa. Recently, the Government of India (GoI) approved the country’s participation in the construction phase of these telescopes.
The full capabilities of SKA will only be available towards the end of this decade, but within the next couple of years, it will already be the most sensitive radio telescope in the world. Early engagement in the commissioning and planning of science projects is crucial for the Indian community to be ready for key roles in the Key Science Projects (KSPs) with the SKA. Simultaneously, the SKAO is awarding contracts for various construction activities. Following the GoI approval, Indian industries are eligible to competitively bid for the contracts. It would be advantageous for academic organizations and industries in India to collaboratively bid for these.
The SKA-India Consortium (SKAIC) has already been coordinating the overall effort of SKA-related activities in India. To support and grow these activities, there have been seven SKA-related workshops in the past ASI meetings which have proved very useful in bringing together the Indian community for participation in the SKA. These were:
(a) ASI 2014 (IISER, Mohali) where the various science working groups were formed,
(b) ASI 2015 (NCRA, Pune) where the SKA India consortium was formed,
(c) ASI 2018 (OU, Hyderabad) where the science requirements and the science DPR were discussed,
(d) ASI 2019 (Christ, Bengaluru) where the technical capabilities and commitments of various Indian institutions and industries were discussed,
(e) ASI 2020 (IISER, Tirupati), where the plans to set up and operate an SKA Regional Centre in India was presented and discussed.
(f) ASI 2021 (online), where scientific, technical and industry persons in the country involved and interested in SKA were brought together to discuss and prepare for the construction phase.
(g) ASI 2022 (IIT Roorkee, hybrid), where the participation of the community in High Performance Computing (HPC) relevant to big data challenges in the SKA era was discussed.
All of these SKA workshops at the ASI meetings received an excellent response and have proven extremely beneficial in ramping up SKA activities in India.
Rationale: The proposed workshop represents the VIIIth chapter of the series organized by SKA-India at the ASI. This is immediately after the approval of the project by GoI, which guarantees opportunities for both academia and industry. The SKA construction has already started for both Mid and Low components, and commissioning and science verification using initial configurations will commence next year. SKAO has recently initiated the process of updating the decade old SKA science book by the end of 2025 and an international SKAO science meeting is also being organized in Germany (June 2025). With all this in mind, SKA-India is rejuvenating the science working groups within India. The relevant infrastructure (regional data centre) is also being built for effective science-user utilization. Already several industry partners are contributing to or in the process of bidding for construction work packages.
The main goals of this workshop are to rapidly ramp up SKA activities in India by (i) strengthening the partnership between academia and industry to maximize the returns for the community, and (ii) ensure the strong participation of the Indian community in future SKA events and activities. We will achieve this through the strong presence of key members of SKAO, SKA-India, and various academic and research institutes and industry partners across the country. This workshop will be complemented by future meetings at ASI focusing on specific science and technical themes for continuous engagement and development of the community.
Participants: Based on previous SKA-India workshops, we expect 80 - 100 participants comprising the following:
- Key members from SKAO and SKA-India will be invited as keynote speakers. They will provide project updates and present opportunities to participate in activities towards the construction of SKA, commissioning and key science projects.
- Scientists and engineers from research institutes and universities will be involved as invited and contributed speakers to present the SKA-relevant initiatives.
- Early career researchers, especially Ph.D. students and postdoctoral fellows from various institutes and universities will constitute more than 50% of the participants. We will include a small number of sparkler talks and posters for their active participation.
- Experts from the industry are already involved in SKA-India activities. They will present their work as talks or posters, and also be encouraged to set up booths at the ASI to showcase their capabilities, which may also be useful for other astronomy projects.
Format of the meeting: We will divide the workshop into the following four sessions.
- Session 1 (120 mins): Overview of SKA: construction, commissioning and science.
- Session 2 (90 mins): Science working group activities and SKA infrastructure in India.
- Session 3 (90 mins): Participation in SKA construction, commissioning and science.
- Session 4 (90 mins): Panel / open discussion, workshop summary and path forward.
Proposers: Neeraj Gupta (IUCAA), Rohit Sharma (IIT Kanpur), Mayuri Rao (RRI), Sumana Nandi (MAHE, Manipal), Narendra Nath Patra (IIT Indore), T. Prabu (RRI), Tirthankar Roy Choudhury (NCRA-TIFR) on behalf of the SKA India Consortium