Interview with NPL Director, Dr. Krishan Lal

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Dr Krishan Lal

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Dream 2047: Sir, NPL, one of the constituent laboratories of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), carries a rich legacy of Dr. K S Krishnan. Can you tell us about some of the major contributions NPL made to Indian science and technology?

Dr. Lal: Primarily, NPL was set up with a mandate of establishing national standards for measurements and carrying out research in areas of physics, which are relevant to the national needs and are of topical interest from global perspective. It might be interesting to note that there were about 500 systems of measurements in India at the time of Independence. NPL had to develop a uniform standards system for India, which was as per international practice in industrialized nations. This was to ensure that there would not be any discrepancy in measurement in any part of the country. Having established the standards, it has to maintain them and upgrade them from time to time. In a way, NPL had to spearhead a quality movement, which was essential for industrialization in the country. It was the wisdom of Indias first Prime Minister Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru that prompted India to adopt a uniform standards system immediately after Independence. In 1956, India adopted the Metric system of standards. In recent times, the advent of ISO certification and a keen interest shown by an increasing number of Indian industrial houses in this certification has led to deeper professional interest in conforming to the established measurement systems.

Internationally, calibration and standards has not been a static field. Every time a new discovery is made in physics or chemistry, there is a flurry of activity to find out whether it can be used for improving measurement accuracies. For instance, the definition of unit of resistance, Ohm, underwent a major change after the discovery of Quantum Hall Effect, which won the German scientist Prof. Klaus Von Klitzeng the Nobel Prize in physics. Recently, attempts are on to improve realization of the unit of time, the second, through laser cooling of atoms so that accuracy of second can further be improved by 100 times. Currently, the cesium atomic clocks have an accuracy of about 10-14. NPL has been perusing research in standards particularly in the field of time and frequency, radiation measurements and quantum metrology.

Dream 2047: Apart from the field of calibration and standards, what are the other areas NPL is working on?

Dr. Lal: I was coming to that. Calibration and standards constitutes only one-third of NPLs activity. Other areas are material science, materials characterization, radio and atmospheric science and superconductivity & cryogenics. In materials science, NPLs work on carbon fibres and composites is quite well known. Very recently, NPL scientists developed a metallic tube for the landing gear of the Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH), one of the prestigious defence projects, being executed by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). It is currently being validated. Another one is research on phosphors. Worldwide, there is an interest in increasing the light retaining power of phosphors. This property of phosphors has tremendous applications. Similarly, NPL scientists have been working in the area of thin film technology too. Besides, NPL has been associating with various space technology programmes where an attempt is on to replace aluminum with a light-weight metal, magnesium, to save on mass of the launching vehicles.

Our Materials Characterization Group is perhaps the best in the country. Even in the world, not many laboratories are doing better work in materials characterization than NPL. NPLs work on methane emission was instrumental in exposing advanced countries claims that India has been contributing substantially to the methane influx into atmosphere causing Green House Effect. Some of the facilities developed in-house have attracted scientists from advanced countries for experiments.

Dream 2047: Can you tell us about some recent measures you have undertaken to improve efficiency?

Dr. Lal: You would not imagine, till recently NPL scientists have been working on about 175 projects, many of them with very little impact. One of my first goals immediately after taking over was to bring down the numbers to about 50 so that a better focus could be given to research work. My aim is to bring it further down to some 25 30 quality research projects by and by. I have been working with the laboratory for so many years. And I know the high potential of its scientists.

Dream 2047: In these days, the productivity of a laboratory is measured by number of patents filed by its scientists and revenue earned from external sources. Can you tell us about NPLs achievements on these counts?

Dr. Lal: When I took over the director about one and half years ago, the external cash flow (ECF) graph was showing a downward trend. Fortunately, we could arrest this trend and right now the ECF last year was the highest in the last 10 years. Our resource generation in 2000-2001 was little more than 20% of the annual grant (Rs 24.62 crore) we received. The revenue from testing and calibration has grown by 20% in the first nine months of the current financial year compared to the same period, last year, the highest in recent times. More importantly, we could bring down the share of salary component in the actual expenditure to ~ 52% from 55.3% in 1999-2000. The number of patents filed is also expected to go up by 50% this year.

Frankly speaking, at the moment the resources are not one of our major worries. We have enough projects. Actually there is a major upgradation project worth Rs. 19.5 crore. The concern is to spend money in proper and judicious manner. It should accelerate the growth of our competence and its linkage with national efforts for development of our country.

 

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National Physical Laboratory Setting Standards

National Physical Laboratory (NPL), New Delhi, is one of the first two laboratories of the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR). Its foundation stone was laid by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, the then Vice President of Interim Government of India, on January 4, 1947. The main NPL building was opened on 21st January 1950 by Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, the then Deputy Prime Minister of India. Late Professor K.S. Krishnan, one of the most renowned physicists produced by India, was the first Director.

The laboratory has been given the responsibility of maintaining, updating and improving by continuous R&D, the national standards of measurements based on the international system (SI). Its mandate also includes R&D in different areas of physics keeping in view the requirements of the country and the development in physics at the international level.

NPL scientists are conducting R&D in the following areas: (i) standards and metrology; (ii) engineering materials; (iii) electronic materials; (iv) materials characterization; (v) radio and atmospheric sciences; and (vi) superconductivity and cryogenics. NPL undertakes sponsored research and R&D projects, consultancy assignments, projects in contract mode and job works. In-house research and development work of long-term nature is carried out in carefully selected niche areas.

The globally accepted international system (SI) of measurements rests on the following seven base units : mass (kilogram); length (meter); time (second); temperature (Kelvin); electric current (Ampere); luminous intensity (candela) and amount of substance (mole). At present NPL realizes the first six base units and R&D work has been started to establish the seventh base unit of mole. It may be mentioned that continuous research is being conducted at the metrology institutes of the world to improve the accuracy of realization of base units. For example, global efforts are being made to use new experiments like the laser cooling of atoms to improve accuracy of measurements of second from 10-14 to 10-16. NPL is also active in this area. The active areas of research in the field of standards and metrology are time and frequency; optical radiation measurements; pressure and vacuum; and quantum measurements including SQUIDs.

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A view of the main building of NPL

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As a part of WTO agreement, all signatory nations have committed to remove scientific and technical barriers to trade. The member nations of the Meter Convention including India have entered into a Mutual Recognition Arrangement; or MRA under which the equivalence of national standards maintained by different countries is to be established. NPL is participating in many international intercomparisons to ensure that equivalence of our national standards and derived units is established with respect to those of the other national metrology institutes. After this exercise is complete, a test or calibration certificate issued by NPL will be acceptable globally.

For an industrialized society like India, quality of its products and services is a key parameter. Measurements play a vital role in management and improvement of the quality across board. A chain of laboratories is needed to provide calibration facilities all over the country. NPL has the responsibility to provide calibration facilities at the apex level so that all the measurements made in the country are traceable to the national standards at NPL and through it to the international standards. The quality movement in the country had a strong boost in the recent past through ISO standards like the ISO 9000 series. This has led to a considerable demand on calibration facilities of NPL. Nearly 4000 calibrations are carried out annually.

In engineering materials R&D work on synthesis and characterization of aerospace engineering materials and components is being pursued vigorously. A few unique facilities like metal forming by atomization of the melt followed by spray deposition have been designed developed and fabricated in the laboratory itself. Several components of materials crucial in space technology and similar applications have been developed successfully. In the field of carbon fibres and carbon-based composites, several critical components for the strategic sectors have already been developed successfully. Some of these are commercially being developed. For the health sector, llizarov Fixators for the polio patients have been developed by using lightweight carbon reinforced plastic rings. Glucose biosensors have been developed and commercialized. These are being widely used in the country. Several other biosensors for uric acid, lactose, etc. are under development. R&D on a variety of polymers, sensors, ferroelectric liquid crystals, super hard materials and organic light emitting diodes is also being pursued.

NPL has expertise in developing a variety of phosphor materials. A long decay phosphor, which can emit radiation for several hours after all lights are switched off, has been developed successfully. Expertise in the field of thin film preparation and characterization by a variety of techniques including plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PECVD) has been developed. Sophisticated equipment for PECVD have been fabricated and supplied to DRDO laboratories, a CSIR sister laboratory and a university. NPL also carried out R&D work on photovoltaic conversion of sunlight into electrical energy.

q Dr. Krishan Lal*

 

For any materials research and development work, a strong back up of materials characterization is essential. Advanced facilities and high quality expertise are available for characterization of materials regarding composition, purity, structure and crystal defects. Bulk materials and thin films can be characterized. Facilities for analysis of liquids and gases have also been established. Some of the sophisticated equipment have been developed indigenously. These include a five crystal X-ray diffractometer with the state-of-the-art level resolution. Fundamental investigations are being carried out on different aspects of materials characterization including those on dynamical diffraction of X-rays from thin crystals of varying degrees of perfection, which has led to direct observation of forward diffracted beam in these crystals and a loss in absorption at Laue diffraction maxima. Also, applied research is carried out on advanced materials, thin films, interfaces, and micro-machined devices. Research and development work on growth and characterization of technologically important single crystals like those of bismuth germanate is also being carried out. Certified reference materials (CRMs) are being prepared to serve as quality management tools in efforts to solve crucial issues like toxic elements in water. Fifteen CRMs, named as Bharatiya Nirdeshak Dravyas have already been developed.

In the field of radio and atmospheric sciences the present focus is on two broad areas. Firstly, R&D work is being conducted on minor species in the atmosphere such as NOX, ozone, CH4 etc. At the local level, occurrence of fog in winter in Delhi and its relationship with atmospheric pollutants is being investigated. Some of the recent activities relate to impact of pollutants on human health and effect of different agricultural practices on loading of atmosphere with minor species of concern from pollution point of view. The other main area is concerned with study of ionosphere for communications. A modern digital lonosonde technique and the effect of terrestrial obstructions on the propagation of microwaves are current areas of research. An interesting facility has been developed for detection of living bodies under concrete debris in the event of a natural disaster or any other mishap. NPL scientists are actively participating in R&D work at Antarctica.

Fundamental aspects of the phenomenon of superconductivity at high temperatures are being investigated covering the effect of substitutional impurities and irradiation. The newer developments in the field of polymers and metal-based superconductors are being taken note of. SQUIDs fabricated out of different types of superconductors have been investigated. Magnetic fields of very low intensity can be measured by employing the indigenously developed SQUIDs. NPL has developed a high level expertise in fabrication of superconducting magnets by using conventional superconducting wires. Magnets to suit different applications can be designed and fabricated. The expertise in the field of cryogenics is being utilized to establish humidity standards. The core of the experiment has been designed, developed and fabricated at NPL.