Vikram Sarabhai Medal awarded to Astrophysicist Annapurni Subramaniam

Professor Annapurni Subramaniam. (Express Photo)Astrophysicist Annapurni Subramaniam has been awarded the COSPAR Vikram Sarabhai Medal – 2026. She is the director of Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, and holds the additional charge as director of the Centre for Nano and Soft Matter Sciences (CeNS).The coveted medal was presented on Monday during the ongoing 46th COSPAR Scientific Assembly underway at Florence, Italy. This international medal is awarded to scientists from developing countries for their outstanding contributions to the field of space research. It is awarded jointly by Committee on Space Research (COSPAR), an international body affiliated to the International Science Council and United Nations (through UN-COPUS) , and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). The medal was constituted in 1990 in the honour of Vikram Sarabhai — the founder of India’s space programme and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Subramaniam is the only fourth Indian to receive this medal, in addition to being the first Indian woman scientist and only the third female recipients of this honour. Among the other Indian recipients of this medal include ISRO scientist and director of ISRO’s Physical Research Laboratory, Anil Bharadwaj (2024), Physicist Gurbax Singh Lakhina (2014) and eminent space scientist and former ISRO chairman, UR Rao, (1996). Subramaniam specialises in stellar physics, studies star clusters and nearby galaxies. She also works extensively on space and ground-based instruments used in astronomy. She made significant contributions and served as the calibration scientist for the Ultra-violet Imaging Telescope (UVIT) onboard AstroSAt, India’s first space-based telescope launched in 2015. She is also involved in the Thirty Metre Telescope (TMT), in which India is one of the participating member countries in the international consortium. She is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences and a member of the International Astronomical Union.Story continues below this ad In 2024, Subramaniam was bestowed with Rashtriya Vigyan Puraskar – Vigyan Shri in the Space Science and Technology category. COSPAR is one of the largest forums for space scientists and holds its scientific assembly biennially. The assembly generally sees a gathering of about 3,000 scientists from around the globe. COSPAR was established in 1958, soon after Soviet Union’s maiden launch of the first-ever satellite in 1957.