Born: 25th September 1920
Died: 3rd January 2002
Prof. Satish Dhawan was born on 25th September 1920, Srinagar, India. He did his education first in India and then in the United States. He is considered as “The Father of Experimental Fluid Dynamics Research” by the Indian scientific community. He was one of the most renowned and brilliant researchers in the field of turbulence and boundary layers. In 1972, he supersede Shri. Vikram Sarabhai and joined, as Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). He served as the Chairman of the Space Commission and also as the Secretary to the Government of India in the Department of Space. During his tenure, he directed the Indian space programme by a period of remarkable growth and marvellous achievement. He gave considerable efforts towards boundary layer research even as the head of the Indian space programme. His spectacular contributions are introduced in the seminal book Boundary Layer Theory, which is written by Hermann Schlichting. He was one of the admired professors at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. He is accredited for setting up the first-ever supersonic wind tunnel in India at the Indian Institute of Science. He also introduced his research on relaminarization of three-dimensional boundary layers, separated boundary layer flows and transonic flows. Prof. Satish Dhawan started experiments in rural education, remote sensing and satellite communications. His efforts lead the way to operational systems such as INSAT- a telecommunications satellite, IRS – the Indian Remote Sensing satellite and the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) that recognized India in the league of space-faring nations. Prof. Satish Dhawan died on 3rd January 2002. Following his demise, the Indian satellite launch centre at Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, was renamed as the Prof. Satish Dhawan Space Centre which is located about 100 km north of Chennai in South India.
