When I was a child, the most complicated machine that I saw was the bullock cart", replies former ISRO Chairman, when a student asks him whether he knew he would become the chairman of the ISRO when he was a child. "My journey into the ISRO was a series of accidents. I was an Engineering student and there was no question of going into space research. Then the government of India started its space research programme and I jumped into it without even knowing the spelling of space!", he adds with a smile much to the uproar from the students around. There was not one dull moment during Madhavan Nair's interaction with the school students at the seminar organised as part of the 150 anniversary celebrations of Swami Vivekananda at the Children's Park in Kochi on Sunday. The children came up with a variety of questions ranging from "How to be a scientist?", to the presence of aliens, to, the end of the world and to "whether the universe was created by a god?". The ISRO Chairman, for his part, seemed to have all the best answers prepared and ready in his kitty."What are the practical applications of the discovery of water in the moon?, was a question posed by a young man in the crowd. "The presence of water is a significant discovery. If we are to have an artificial colony on moon, the presence of water would be highly significant. The presence of water on the moon was largely dismissed because of the hard vacuum and the high temperatures. We can also utilize the hydrogen there to fuel space crafts. But we found that at the polar areas the case was different. There was large presence of ice." Creation of artificial colonies on the moon was theoretically possible, he said. "But it will be very difficult since there are no animals or plant. May be it will happen in the days to come", he said. The visit to the moon was the most satisfying moment in his life, the space scientist said. "It was very unexpected. We were able to reach there in the first attempt. We could cover 400 thousand Kilometres with a precision of 10 Km. Besides it was our first attempt while in most cases the Russian and American space programme usually reach by the 6th or the 10th attempt.Responding to a question on the end of the world and the Mayan theory, the ISRO Chief said "There is no question of the end of the world unless someone foolishly puts an atomic bomb somewhere", he said. The Mayan theory has no scientific basis, he said. But he was more enthusiastic when it came to aliens, "The possibility of the presence of life in other planets is quite high considering there are billions of galaxies and a corresponding number of stars and other bodies. But there are many conditions which are needed for the presence of life. As of now, there are just about two planets that have been discovered who have some of these qualities. The radiations that we are tracking from across the universe too does not have shown any evidence. But many of the discoveries today were impossible a few years back. So it is completely possible that there is presence of life," he said.
Comments
0 comment