34th Annual Report (2021-22)

DIRECTOR'S REPORT 11 In over three decades, one of the main objectives of IUCAA has been to become and remain a Centre of Excellence in education, training and research among Indian Universities. Our robust and flourishing research programme is among the best in the world in Astronomy and Astrophysics (A&A) and related subjects. IUCAA was set up to promote nucleation and growth of active groups in A&A in Indian Universities and Colleges, and to provide general guidance and help for A&A activities in India and neighbouring countries. IUCAA has always put in the best effort to achieve these objectives, and has maintained the emphasis on fundamental research and innovative teaching in almost all areas of A&A. Not only has an Astronomy Centre for Education (IUCAA-ACE) been set up at IUCAA, with a National Resource Centre of the Ministry of Education for producing online courses, over the last year a new feather has been added to this cap. The International Astronomical Union has established a centre of its Office of Education (IAU-OAE) at IUCAA, which will be part of the IUCAA-ACE activities. Over the last decade, IUCAA has assumed a leading role in mega-projects of national importance, including LIGO-India and the Thirty Metre Telescope, and is a significant contributing partner in the Square Kilometre Array and various space projects of ISRO, including AstroSat, and Aditya–L1, whose launch is imminent. The AstroSat Science Support Cell has been functioning very well with financial support from ISRO, through which members of IUCAA and substantial number of Visiting Associates and their students could collect and analyse observational data, and publish a number of research papers in leading journals such as Nature , making a substantial impact. During the last academic year, IUCAA, together with the Savitribai Phule Pune University, has started an MSc programme leading to a Physics with Astrophysics degree. In this programme, the entire second year will be taught by IUCAA faculty, along with supervision of a project for each student. In parallel, A new generation of IUCAA Centres for Astronomy Research and Development (ICARDs) have been set up all through the country, to enhance teaching and research in Indian Universities/ Colleges. Currently these are at Cooch Behar, Delhi, Manipal, Nanded, Kochi, Kolkata, Gorakhpur, Haridwar, Indore, Kozhikode, Raipur, Pilani, Silguri, Srinagar (J&K), Tezpur and Thodupaza, Workshops for academics in the region are being organised at these Centres. A Precision and Quantum Measurement laboratory has been established in IUCAA, as a part of the DST's nationwide Quantum initiative QUEST. This facility offers to build one of the most sensitive optical atomic clocks at 467 nm wavelength, and will also aid the training of various young researchers for laser- related activities for LIGO-India. IUCAA currently has 27 core members of faculty, including the Director, 6 Emeritus Professors, 3 Visiting and Adjunct Professors, 31 Postdoctoral fellows and 67 PhD students. There are 37 Scientific and Technical Staff and 30 members of Administrative staff. Ten students obtained their PhDduring the last year. I am very proud indeed to say that the academic members published 247 peer- reviewed papers in the previous year, with a mean impact factor of 3.34. This shows that our colleagues are not just very productive in research of the highest