The inauguration of the AEISS theme under the One Week One Theme campaign was held from 2-4 August 2024 at CSIR-NPL, New Delhi, with participating laboratories — CSIR-CSIO, CSIR-CEERI, CSIR-NPL and CSIR-IIP, bringing out the achievements of the theme in the areas of electronics and instrumentation.
The second event under the theme was conducted at CSIR-IMMT, Bhubaneswar, from 12-13 August 2024 with participating laboratories — CSIR-NAL, CSIR-NML, CSIR-AMPRI, CSIR-CGCRI and CSIR-CMERI, focusing on the aerospace technologies based on materials and mechanical systems for aircraft.
The third and final event was concluded at CSIR-NAL with participation from CSIR-NAL, CSIR-4PI, CSIR-NIIST, CSIR-NCL, CSIR-NML, CSIR-CEERI and IIMT.
At CSIR-NPL
CSIR-NPL organised a three-day programme on the AEISS theme, during which Prof. Venugopal Achanta, Director, CSIR-NPL, extended a warm welcome to everyone.
In his keynote address, Dr Abhay Anant Pashilkar, Director, CSIR-NAL and AEISS Theme Director, elaborated on the theme, outlining its pivotal role in achieving Atmanirbhar Bharat, Swasth Bharat, and Make in India initiatives. He also discussed the projected targets associated with the theme. Dr PC Panchariya, Director, CSIR-CEERI, highlighted the crucial role of the theme in driving industrial growth and elaborated on the significance of a single-window system for smooth and straightforward technology transfer.
Dr SK Dubey, the workshop convener, outlined the three-day agenda. This included a student-scientist interaction session, a Startup/MSME/Industry meet, and a focus on women in AEISS. He concluded by proposing a vote of thanks. Over 60 students participated in the student-scientist interaction programme. They explored the exhibition and engaged with scientists during the second session. A science quiz based on the exhibition concluded the first day of the event.
The inaugural was followed by an exhibition, during which, as part of the jigyasa programme, school students visited the exhibition that showcased the latest technologies and innovations in science. The exhibition’s main focus at the CSIR-NPL museum was the product demonstration of cutting-edge technologies.
The second day was focused on industry collaborations, highlighting technologies developed and sold to industries by CSIR. Industries were provided a platform for panel discussions where they could showcase their technologies and interact with leading experts. The day also featured various talks from renowned scientists, providing insights into their work’s significance and enlightening us about new research and technologies. The networking sessions helped to foster collaboration and knowledge-sharing.
The third day was devoted to celebrating the contributions and achievements of women in science and technology. It featured talks on new and interesting research by women scientists. These sessions aimed to motivate and inspire young girls to pursue careers in S&T.
At CSIR-IMMT
In the inaugural, Dr Kota Harinarayana, Padma Shri Awardee, was the Chief Guest and delivered the keynote address and the Guest of Honour Dr Naresh Chandra Murmu, Director CMERI and CGCRI. The Director-in-Charge of CSIR-IMMT, Dr LD Besra, welcomed the gathering with his address. The programme was attended by scientists, teachers, scholars and external participants.
During the first technical session after the inaugural ceremony, Dr A Udayakumar from CSIR-NAL delivered his talk on Continuous Fibre Reinforced Ceramic Matrix composites for application in aircraft brake discs. He demonstrated C/SiC disc-shaped composites fabricated via the CVI +LSI process, which exhibited superior specific strength at higher temperatures and a delayed fracture due to multiple energy dissipating events within the system. This was followed by an insightful talk on stealth technology by Dr Balamati Choudhury from CSIR-NAL, which necessitated the need for indigenously developed lightweight multilayer stealth coating to bring self-reliance to the defence sector.
The session proceeded with a talk by Dr Murugan Thangadurai, CSIR-CMERI, on mechanical systems for aircraft applications, wherein he discussed the problems caused during the launch of a missile after opening the cavity doors. The session concluded with a talk by Dr Atiar Rahaman Molla from CSIR-CGCRI on developing strong transparent glass-ceramic material and laminated armour for combat aircraft and vehicle applications.
In the exhibition, stalls with posters, models, components, materials and live demonstrations were organised at the CRTDH complex of IMMT. All participants visited the exhibits and interacted with scientists and scholars. Stalls were from all participating CSIR labs. In addition to this, HAL also displayed some aerospace components. One stall was allotted to a startup company.
On the second day, i-SMART connects — a panel discussion was conducted, bringing the stakeholders from various sectors connected to the objective and theme of the event — Industry, Startup, MSME, Academia, Research and Technology (i-SMART) connect. The programme was attended by about 200 participants representing all sectors and included very fruitful and constructive discussions/interactions. Dr Niladri Roy, Additional Director, DRDO, Chandipur, chaired the panel discussion. The programme successfully connected the dots and paved the way for new collaborations.
Next, a technical session started with a talk by Dr Soma Hansda on advanced ceramics for aerospace applications, elaborating on the development of Cf-SiC ball bearings for brake discs. For efficient braking, the fabricated disc brakes exhibited high water and corrosion resistance, superior thermal shock resistance, and exceptional strength at higher temperatures.
Dr Shailesh Jha delivered the next talk on the electrodeposition of binary and ternary Zn-alloy as a replacement for toxic Cd coatings. This was followed by an insight into smart material-based actuators by Dr Hari Bhargaw, who used wire-shaped memory alloys (SMA) as the core material. Owing to their modular design and facile processing methods, these actuators are used in various fields like automotive, prosthetics, and soft-gripper applications. The next talk by Dr DP Das shed light on indigenous instrumentation for mineral industries, highlighting in-house instruments such as eye-on-pellet, EIT-based slurry density monitoring, and battery health monitoring.
Dr Abhishek Pandey briefly introduced various Additive Manufacturing (AM) techniques with a special focus on the laser powder bed AM facility for 3D printing at CSIR-AMPRI. This was followed by discussions by Dr Venkat ANCh on developing Al-based hybrid composite closed cell foams for defence applications. His talk covered the development of a core sandwich Kevlar-Al composite foam that demonstrated exceptional performance for deformation behaviour under low impact compared to conventional foam. Mr Shubhra Bajpai highlighted the importance of developing efficient thermal barrier coatings for defence applications. Dr Manju Unnikrishnan presented a quick insight into the emerging high-temperature magnetic refrigeration technology. The session concluded with a presentation on stealth materials by Dr Mamata Mahapatra.
There was a transfer of technology on Stealth Materials developed by CSIR-IMMT and CSIR-NAL. About 350 school students were invited and participated in the OWOT programme. Guided lab visit programmes were conducted in the first half for the school students, and in the afternoon, they all visited the exhibits and interacted with exhibitors.
Dr Santosh Kumar Behera, Convener of OWOT function, delivered the vote of thanks.
At CSIR-NAL
Initiating the programme, Dr Abhay A Pashilkar, Director, CSIR-NAL, delivered the keynote lecture and highlighted the vision and mission of various participating laboratories in the theme and their salient achievements in aerospace-related technologies. Dr Pashilkar also provided glimpses of R&D focus areas catering to the needs of aircraft programmes in the country.
In her opening remarks, Dr Sridevi Jade, Director, CSIR-4PI, summarised various verticals her laboratory is pursuing and CSIR-4PI’s contributions in data science products across all themes of CSIR. She emphasised the need for AI-enabled technologies and systems in various sectors, including aerospace.
The Director, CSIO, made a virtual presentation and highlighted CSIO’s contributions to head-up display and instrumentation for strategic and manufacturing sectors in the country.
Shri Jitendra J Jadhav, Director, ADA, and Programme Director, Combat Aircraft, was the Chief Guest of the inaugural session and presented in detail various ongoing aircraft programmes in the country, including defence and civil sectors. He also presented future aircraft programmes such as AMCA and RTA. He explained how close to 380 private industries in the country contributed to the success of the LCA programme and presented other enabling technologies, namely, Additive Manufacturing and Industry 4.0, which need to be implemented in aircraft manufacturing. He invited the industries for the success of various national aircraft programmes and also touched upon policy support by the government for private players in these large aircraft programmes.
The Guest of Honour, Shri Subramanya Ullal, Member Board of Directors, SASMOS HET Technologies Ltd., highlighted the contributions of SASMOS in the aviation sector and also brought out the challenges faced by the small and medium-scale industries while participating in national aerospace programmes. In particular, he highlighted the need for quality control and assurance in the technologies being developed by private players in India for the aerospace sector.
Following the inaugural session, the exhibition of various technologies developed by CSIR-NAL and other participating CSIR laboratories was inaugurated by the Chief Guest at the Golden Jubilee Aircraft Hangar, CSIR-NAL Belur Campus. A student visit was organised in the afternoon session, followed by a quiz contest in the JIGYASA programme. Around 80 school students participated in this event.
On the second day, Dr Ashish Lele, Director, CSIR-NCL, was the Chief Guest for the inauguration of the technical sessions. In his address, he appreciated the various major aircraft programmes being undertaken by CSIR-NAL and assured that NCL and other national laboratories will contribute to these programmes’ success. Following this, there were six presentations on aerial vehicles by programme directors of HAPS, SARAS-MkII, HANSA-NG, and drones for solid waste management. Dr CM Ananda, Programme Director, Civil Aviation Programme, presented a detailed overview of various past, present and future aircraft activities of CSIR-NAL. A large number of industries participated in this session.
In the next session, the project leaders from CSIR-NAL briefly summarised various indigenously developed deep technologies; this was followed by another session on aerospace materials technologies, which are being developed to support the aircraft programmes of CSIR-NAL. The afternoon session was dedicated to the contributions of other CSIR laboratories, such as CSIR-4PI, CSIR-IMMT, CSIR-CEERI & CSIR-NML in AI-enabled technologies and systems and technologies for advanced devices.
On the third day, the cluster chairpersons of various clusters of CSIR-NAL, namely systems, materials, aerothermal, structural and aircraft clusters, made brief presentations on CSIR-NAL capabilities, facilities, and services under various clusters. The idea of this session was to facilitate modalities for the mode of engagement with the industry to utilise the competencies, facilities, and services offered by CSIR-NAL and other participating labs. This session was followed by another interesting session on the aircraft development eco-system in the country by experts from various private and public sector aerospace giants such as Adani Defence & Aero and HAL.
An NDA was signed with M/s Tata Elxsi Limited, Bengaluru, to explore collaborations in Urban Air Mobility (UAM), Test Infrastructure & Test Expertise.
The third session was focused on Industry 4.0. Speakers from Central Manufacturing Technology Institute (CMTI), Bengaluru, and Siemens, Bengaluru, elaborated on this interesting topic and presented case studies of Industry 4.0 implemented at CMTI and Siemens.
The last session was attended by subject experts from software giants Siemens, Dassault, ANSYS, and Altair, who discussed Digital Twin and Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE). All the experienced speakers from these four software companies shared their experience in Digital Twins and showcased how the innovative solutions offered by their firms are helping the Aerospace community.
The success of CSIR-NAL’s OWOT event is evident from the participation of more than 1000 engineering college students from different parts of the country, 400 school students, close to 400 individuals and a record of 50 plus industries. The event was also represented by CSIR-NAL’s sister laboratories: NCL, CMERI, NIIST, 4PI, NML, IMMT and CEERI. Further, there was a great mix of interaction between various CSIR laboratories and public and defence sector PSUs involved in the aviation sector.
The industry participants exhibited keen interest in collaborating and requested that CSIR-NAL consider them partners in all major programmes.
