Indian astrophysicist Prahlad Chandra Agrawal received the prestigious COSPAR Harrie Massey Award 2024 at the 45th COSPAR Scientific Assembly opening ceremony in Busan, South Korea, on July 15. He is the first Indian recipient of the award for space research.
The award recognises outstanding contributions to the development of space research, in which a leadership role is of particular importance. Along with a medal and citation, the awardee is honoured by the naming of a Minor Planet (20064 Prahladagrawal), says a statement from Agarwal’s family.
Agrawal, 83, was the guiding force and Principal Investigator for the ambitious AstroSat project, India’s first dedicated multi-wavelength space telescope, launched on September 28, 2015. Planned as a five-year mission, AstroSat is still producing useful data, most recently resulting in a significant discovery regarding the black hole binary source Swift J1727.8-1623. AstroSat observations have been cited in over 500 research papers, resulting in more than 30 PhD theses. AstroSat’s open source data is available to researchers worldwide.
Agrawal is a former Senior Professor of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) in the Space Physics department. He was also a member of the Lunar Task Force set up by ISRO to prepare the project report of India’s first Moon mission (Chandrayaan 1).