India will be a partner in increasing facilities in Britain's premier Rutherford Appleton Laboratory

Tags: Science and Technology

Dr. Jitendra Singh, Union Minister for Science and Technology visited theRutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL),a premier institution in the United Kingdom on 28 April 2023.

An Overview of the News

• Dr Jitendra Singh is leading a high level official Indian delegation from the Ministry of Science and Technology on a 6-day visit to the United Kingdom.

• During this Dr Singh met researchers including those working on the UK-India ISIS project.

• The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) is one of the national scientific research laboratories operated by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) in the UK.

• In addition to the indigenous (hosting) facilities for the United Kingdom (UK), RAL also operates departments to co-ordinate the UK program of participation at major international facilities.

• The biggest of these are particle physics and space science.

• Minister said under mega facilities for basic research, Indian researchers are collaborating with international institutes like CERN (CERN – Geneva), FAIR (FAIR – Germany), TMT (USA), Fermilab (USA) and LIGO (USA) .

• The ISIS Accelerator at RAL is one of the few major research centers undertaking neutron scattering studies in materials research.

• Its Phase II (2023-28) proposal is under consideration which has 5 components,

Advanced Gravitational-wave Detector in Maharashtra:

• In another breakthrough in the field of science and innovation, the LIGO-India project has been approved in Maharashtra to build an advanced gravitational-wave detector.

• The construction of the facility is expected to be completed by 2030 at an estimated cost of Rs 2,600 crore.

• The observatory will be the third of its kind, built to the exact specifications of the Twin Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatories (LIGO) to operate in conjunction with those in Louisiana and Washington.