Indo-Russian joint venture BrahMos Aerospace has tied up research with plans to take up collaborative research work with the National Institute of Technology (NIT) at Thiruchirapally in Tamil Nadu as part of its programme of participative research with educational institutions for development of hypersonic version of Brahmos missiles.

BrahMos is initiating research collaboration with a number of academic and industrial institutions across the country for development of robotics, sensitive materials etc required for hypersonic missiles, its CEO and MD Dr Sivathanu Pillai said.

He was addressing a gathering at the eighth edition of ‘Pragyan-2012’, the annual techno-management festival at the National Institute of Technology-Trichy.

The Pragyan fest has, meanwhile, received the ISO 9001 (2008 edition) certification for conducting seven memorable editions, giving it the stature of an international festival, last year. Pragyan is now among the top five student technical festivals in the country.

BrahMos is in the process of venturing into development, design and production of hypersonic missiles, which can travel at seven to eight times the speed of sound (7-8 Mach), Shivatanu Pillai said.

He said BrahMos is on the look out for new materials that could withstand high speed and heavy vibration in the development of hypersonic missiles.

NIT-T, which has courses in disciplines like robotics, material management, metallurgy, was among the institutions being roped in for the collaboration, Pillai, who made a presentation at Pragyan, the annual Techno-Management festival of the institute, said.

NIT- Trichy director Dr Srinivasan Sundararajan said discussions with BrahMos had already been initiated and the collaboration agreement would be finalized soon.

source: http://www.domain-b.com / Defence> Arms & Munitions / February 25th, 2012