Chandrakanta Kumar (M’09, SM’12) was born in Shibpur, W.B., India in 1976. He received his M.Tech and PhD in Radio Physics and Electronics from the University of Calcutta, India, in the year 2001 and 2012 respectively. He has also completed Space Studies Program, from International Space University,
Strasbourg, France, in 2013. After completion of his M. Tech, he joined Communication Systems Group of ISRO Satellite Centre, Bangalore, India as an engineer. Since then he is actively involved in design and development of antenna systems for the Indian space programme and related ground stations including ‘Indian deep space network station’ IDSN-32. He has worked on the antenna systems of about 15 spacecrafts operating in the frequency range between VHF to Ka- band. The low gain antenna (LGA) and medium gain antenna (MGA) of the Mars Orbiter Mission was designed by him. He served as project manager, antenna systems, for the first Indian mission to the Moon; Chandrayaan-1/Moon Impact Probe, scientific mission
ASTROSAT and the communication satellite GSAT-12. Presently, as a
Deputy Project Director; he is responsible for the RF systems of the
ISRO’s upcoming soft landing mission to the Moon, Chandrayaan-2. He
has about 85 publications in international journals and conferences,
including 26 in IEEE journals to his credit. He is at present supervising
two PhD and one MTech students. His areas of interest are light weight
antennas for spacecraft, phased array antennas, microstrip patch antennas,
DGS integrated antennas, DR antennas, etc.
Dr. Kumar is on the Execom of IEEE Bangalore Section and is looking after the ‘Conference Technical Co-Sponsorship Affiliation’ activities as a co-coordinator. He has served seven national/ international conferences/symposia in various capacities. He is a recipient of ‘Prof. S.N. Mitra Memorial Award-2011’ from IETE, India and ‘Young Scientist Award-2009’ from Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). He is also a member of the team that received ‘Team Excellence Award-2008’ of ISRO for his design of Chandrayaan-1 antenna systems. He is a Fellow of IETE, India; Senior Member of IEEE, USA; and life member of Astronautical Society of India. He is on the board of reviewers of journals like the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters, IET Microwaves, Antennas & Propagation, International Journal of Antennas and Propagation, Indian Journal of Radio & Space Physics, etc.