Guest Lecture on
"Moon Impact Probe -- Carrier of the Indian Flag to the Moon"

Madan Lal, Outstanding Scientist, Former Project Leader, Moon Impact Probe & Former Deputy Director, VSSC / ISRO

Qualification
B.Sc. Engineering (Aeronautical), 1969, From Punjab Engineering College Chandigarh

Joined Vikram Sarabhai Space Center, the lead Center of Indian Space Research Organization, in 1969 and retired in June,2007 after serving for 38 years. Important positions held and the major contributions/achievements are--

Positions held

* Deputy Director, Launch Vehicle Design Entity (LVDE)
* Project Director, Re-usable launch Vehicle-Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD) Project
* Project Leader, Moon Impact Probe (MIP) Project
* Associate Project Director, Space Capsule Recovery Experiment (SRE) Project
* Group Director, Aerospace Flight Dynamics Group
* Head, Flight Mechanics Division
* Deputy Project Director, GSLV-MK-III, PSLV & RSR Projects

Major Contributions/Achievements

* Played a critical role in design & development of all indigenous space transportation systems right from Sounding rockets to geo-stationary launch vehicle GSLV.
* Played a leading role in design, development and realization of systems related to India’s first re-entry and recovery mission SRE which had a very successful flight in January,2007.
* As Project Leader of Moon Impact Probe from 2004 to 2007 I was responsible for managing and executing the design, development and hardware realization of this probe which had a very successful journey to Moon recently and placed the national flag on the Moon.
* As Project Director, led the activities of ‘Reusable Launch Vehicle-Technology Demonstrator’ which is a fore-runner for ISRO’s future reusable launch vehicle to make access to space more cost effective.
* Lastly as Chairman of committee on ‘Indian Manned Space Program’ I was responsible for bringing out a very comprehensive proposal and presented it to the national experts team. Now it is an ongoing programme

Foreign Assignments

* Participated in dynamic stability and stage separation tests of India’s first Satellite Launch Vehicle SLV-3 in Germany.
* Managed the contracts on wind tunnel testing, pogo and slosh of GSLV as resident engineer in Russia .
* Managed the contract on testing of SRE model in high enthalpy plasma tunnel of Italian Space Agency

Areas Of Specialization: Vehicle sizing and configuration design, flight dynamics, trajectory design& analysis, Stage separation dynamics, parameter estimation from flight data, mission planning/design/analysis, re-entry& recovery dynamics

Publications : Have presented/published about twenty papers in national and international conferences and journals.

Awards : Team excellence award by ISRO in 2007 for successful accomplishment of Space Capsule Recovery Experiment Mission

Membership of Professional Bodies
* Life Member, Aeronautical Society of India
* Life Member, Astronautical Society of India
* Life Member, Society of R&D Managers of India