Article Posted on : - Mar 28, 2010

A model of the Reusable Launch Vehicle-Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD). A ISRO Photo.

BANGALORE (PTI): India is developing a winged reusable rocket and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has configured a Technology Demonstrator as a first step towards realising it, the space agency said in a report.

India's space scientists have already configured a winged Reusable Launch Vehicle Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD). This is a first step towards realising a Two Stage To Orbit (TSTO) fully re-reusable launch vehicle, according to Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

The agency said in its latest annual report that a series of technology demonstration missions have been conceived.

"The RLV-TD will act as a flying test bed to evaluate various technologies like hypersonic flight, autonomous landing, powered cruise flight and hypersonic flight using air breathing propulsion. First in the series of demonstration trials is the hypersonic flight experiment (HEX)," it said.

Meanwhile, for the Chandrayaan-2 mission, expected by 2012-13, ISRO has received 36 Indian payload proposals for orbiter and lander/rover.

The Scientific Advisory Board of Chandrayaan-2, a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-1, is currently in the process of reviewing the payloads proposed for orbiter.

ISRO sources said the space agency has also received foreign proposals evincing interest to send their instruments for hosting by the Chandrayaan-2 which would be jointly developed with Russia.

It would have an Indian orbiter and mini-rover, and Russian lander and rover.

According to ISRO, the Megha-Tropiques satellite, an Indo-French joint mission for the study of the tropical atmosphere and climate related aspects, is expected to be launched later this year.

It is set to join a string of global spacecraft designated to study climate change.

"Considering the strong global demand for data from Megha-Tropiques, ISRO, CNES (French space agency) and NASA have agreed to integrate this satellite into Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) constellation of satellites," ISRO said.

"With this, Megha-Tropiques will be one of the eight satellites contributing to the global scientific community to study and understand the dynamics of climate system," it said.

Data from the recently-launched Oceansat-2, which carried an atmospheric sounder 'ROSA' from Italy apart from main payloads - ocean colour monitor and scatterometer -- is highly sought after by international scientific community.

In this respect, a cooperative programme on sharing the data with National Aeronautics and Space Administration and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for their operational research is expected to be signed shortly, it said.