India and France in joint interplanetary missions

The Indian and French government have signed an MoU to collaborate on inter-planetary missions, as part of their joint vision for space cooperation. “ISRO and CNES will work together on autonomous navigation of rovers on Moon, Mars and other planets, aero- braking technologies for planetary exploration and modelling of Mars and Venus atmosphere as also inflatable systems for the exploration of Venus,” according to the Document. Dr K Sivan, Chairman ISRO added that “Based on ISRO’s Announcement of Opportunity for the MOM-2 mission, we shortlisted some payloads. We will study the payloads and configure a spacecraft for the mission. Currently, there is no plan for collaboration with the CNES for the mission. However, we may consider joint cooperation with CNES for the MOM-2 mission.”