IIT Hyderabad to hunt for Einstein’s waves as InPTA joins global efforts

Hyderabad:  The formal entry of Indian Pulsar Timing Array (InPTA), as a full member of IPTA, has opened the doors for greater participation by IIT Hyderabad researchers, in the search for Einstein’s waves from monster black holes.
The largest radio telescopes in the world are routinely being used by an international experiment, called International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA), to precisely measure the clock periods of a collection of these radio pulsars.
InPTA is a collaboration of currently about 25 research scientists and students from 15 institutions in India and abroad. Dr. Shantanu Desai, Raghav Girgaonkar, Ashwin Pandey are currently part of this prestigious collaboration from IIT Hyderabad. The collaboration also includes one IITH alumni, Suryarao Bethapudi, currently a PhD student in MPIFR, Germany.
InPTA uses the uGMRT, operated by the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, for monitoring about 6 to 20-millisecond20 millisecond pulsars since 2015.
Recently, this consortium of mainly Indian researchers, which regularly employs the upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (uGMRT), situated near Pune, became a full member of the international effort to discover and study very low-frequency gravitational waves, also known as Einstein waves, from monster black holes going around each other in orbit.
Highlighting the significance of this achievement, Dr. Shantanu Desai, Associate Professor, Department of Physics, said, “IITH has been part of the Indian Pulsar Timing array since 2017. Our students participate in the data collection using the unique capabilities of the uGMRT and are playing an important role in ongoing data analysis in partnership with NCRA-TIFR.