Byalalu, Karnataka:
The biggest challenge for any mission to Mars is how do you communicate with an object that is some 200 million kilometres away, as converting those faint whispers into intelligent signals is a Herculean task. India has set up a giant dish antenna 32 meters in diameter exactly for this purpose. NDTV travelled to this giant celestial listening post to understand how the many challenges were overcome.
India's biggest dish antenna, a whopping 32 meters in diameter which dominates the sky in sub-urban Bangalore, is the country's listening post for its Mangalyaan mission. It is large so that it can send and receive the faint murmurs from India's Martian explorer even when it is some 400 million kilometres away at its farthest point.
Communicating with Mangalyaan is going to be a big challenge. The distances are so far that when one says or sends a message 'Hello, how are you Mangalyaan?' it will take at least 20 minutes for it to be received by the satellite and for Mangalyaan to respond saying 'Bangalore, I am fine' another 20 minutes would have lapsed. So, a simple conversation has a lag of almost 40 minutes.
This challenge has been overcome by incorporating as many as four computers on the space craft that give it a lot of autonomy to take decisions on its own.
TK Rajendran, Communications scientist, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Bangalore, says "Yes, we can communicate with India's Mars mission and we are ready for it."
India is also taking help from NASA to use their communications network to track Mangalyaan during the times it is not visible from India.