The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Tapping the potential of defence technology

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jul 31, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Tapping the potential of defence technology

The system developed by her team at the Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics makes it easier for those manning artillery under battle conditions, scientist Anshu Bharadwaj tells K. Satyamurty

The deployment of artillery under battle conditions has now become a high-tech operation. Geographical Positioning System and Remote Sensing intelligence get fed into advanced computers that generate data for positioning the guns. Distance, target and trajectory are carefully analysed and passed on within minutes to officers manning the artillery.

"Under actual battle conditions, commanding officers who have to direct artillery fire on enemy positions are under tremendous stress. In the past, they had to depend on less data. It was more of guess work. What we are doing makes their job easier and perhaps reduce their stress level,'' says Anshu Bharadwaj, a scientist at the Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (CAIR), a part of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), here. The young scientist is proud that the system developed by her team is equal to the most advanced ones developed by countries such as the U.S, Israel and Russia.

"They have the best in the world and we have them too,'' she says with a smile. The systems developed at CAIR have undergone extensive trial and upgradation and are under production," she says. Robotics is another of Ms. Bharadwaj's field of specialisation. The specific objectives of her team were to develop those that could be used to monitor turbines in nuclear power plants. Owing to radiation risk, human beings cannot be in proximity to nuclear turbines for long. The most interesting part is that the robotics designed here cost just one fourth of what otherwise have to be imported, she says.

Ms. Bharadwaj was brought up and educated for a while in Dehra Dun. Even as a schoolgirl, science and especially robots held a fascination for her. After completing her B.Tech. in Electronics, she applied at DRDO and was selected for training. "I chose the job as it will be the right kind of career for me and provide me the right working environment," she says. she says. In the eight years she has been with the premier organisation, she was sponsored to obtain her masters' degree from IIT, Madras. Secure digital communication is another area in which she has worked at CAIR. Another project she enjoyed being associated with was the one to develop a wheel chair with built-in sensors. The sensors will detect any obstruction or changes in gradient and make suitable changes so that the chair moves along the right direction.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Karnataka

News Update

Stories in this Section