Distinguished scientist Dr Bikash Sinha, former director of the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC) and former director of the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP), called upon all Saarc countries to join hands to set up a multi-disciplinary centre in India on the pattern of the Cern facility in Switzerland.
“The Saarc countries will have a base in India and we can set up an accelerator here. We must give emphasis to both fundamental science as also cutting edge technology. This will give a fillip to scientists across this region,” said Dr Sinha at the Indian Science Congress.
It was during Dr Sinha’s tenure at SINP that scientists under his stewardship came up with a new chip called Manas which is being used at Cern while VECC built the Photon Multiplicity Detector also being used at Cern.
Dr Sinha pointed out that the K130 cycltron magnet was made in India under the collaboration of three premier science institutes of Mumbai, Kolkata and Delhi.
India must collaborate in mega science global projects for the Indian scientists to cut their teeth, he said. Indian scientists were on the forefront in building the ION Accelerators for the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy ION Research in Germany.
Dr S.S. Hasan, former director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Bengaluru, described how India planned to set up the largest solar telescope in the world to conduct a high-resolution study of the sun.
Dr Hasan said, “We need to understand how the magnetic field of the sun is generated. We also need to understand the sun spots and study its chromospheres.”
A detailed project report for the construction of this two-metre telescope had been submitted to the government. Two sites in Ladakh — Hanle and Merak — had been selected and he hoped that work on this mega facility would start 2013 to become operational by 2017. Dr Hasan also cautioned the need for trained astrophysicists to man this and other upcoming sites.