The activities of the Radio and Atmospheric Sciences Division comprise with two Major Laboratory projects of the laboratory. The first project is entitled “Radio Physics and Applications”. It deals with the characterization of ionized and non ionized media to aid ionospheric and tropospheric communication systems. Incase of ionospheric communication the work are mainly on space physics, HF communication and navigational application while for tropospheric communication, it covers all aspects of radio wave propagation over both terrestrial and earth space paths and mobile as well as marine communication covering the frequency from VHF up to many giga hertz of radio frequency spectrum.

The main achievements in the area of space physics include collection of different types of long series of ionospheric data for Indian zone for developing ionospheric models, validation of international reference ionosphere (IRI) model, development of user friendly point to-point HF-link prediction and TEC models for Indian zone for radio cmmunication and navigation and software development for tomographic images over Indian zone, activities of RWC-India for providing Space Weather Services, HF-link predictions etc to the users, storm time ionospheric HF predictions model over Delhi, initiated new study related to earthquake precursor observed as ionospheric perturbations few days before the actual occurrence of an earthquake, prediction of next solar cycle 24 for various applications including ionospheric predictions, satellite launching and tracking .etc., some storm time studies conducted for low ionospheric activity storm, the design of electrometer for both Ion & Electron RPA for Satellite for Earth’s Near Space Environment (SENSE) experiment and a VLF receiver system sent to Antarctica as part of winter programme.

The work carried out in tropospheric communication include estimation of several cloud parameters viz. radar reflectivity, cloud thickness, cloud height, vertical integrated liquid water content, rain rate distribution, precipitation accumulation and rain fall drop velocity etc. , from the measurements of cloud parameters taken by the Doppler radar operating in C-band belonging to the India Meteorological Department over Kolkata for radio communication application, the performance of satellite communication over earth space path for direct to home (DTH) services at 12 GHz on the basis of carrier intensity observations pertaining to the monsoon months under clear air, cloudy and rainy condition, application of radio planning tool to predict path loss along Indian rail road and over rural zones, effect of railway tunnels on mobile communications in western India, preliminary work on rural communications in difficult terrains of Orissa and Jharkhand Regions and experiments in 900 MHz band in NCR region using in collaboration with Aircom International, planned the radio system configuration and configuration of a Doppler Sodar for the study of Thermal structure Parameter of the boundary layer up to a height of 400m.

The second Major Laboratory Project is entitled “Atmospheric Environment and Global Change”. The main achievements in this project are the operation of a micro pulse lidar for continuous measurements of aerosols and clouds, estimation of vertical distribution of ozone over Delhi, Pune and Trivandrum revealing significantly high tropospheric ozone during January-February, estimation of budget of carbonaceous aerosols from biofuels from the district wide sampling in Delhi, detecting influence of monsoon associated mesoscale convection systems on tropical tropopause region, estimation of aerosol radiation forcing over Kanpur during pre monsoon, single scattering Albedo and aerosol radiation forcing estimation over Delhi for five years (2002-06), seasonal variation of aerosol black carbon and its impact over radiation flux over Delhi, investigation of some anomalous features in the Martian ionosphere using Mars global surveyor data, interesting new data sets on CO from snow pack in polar regions, size distribution among surface aerosols in 2007 using GRIMM spectrometer, continuation of regular ambient observations related to surface ozone, NOx, CO, NMHC, column content of Ozone, water vapour AOD and UV radiation as well as theoretical explanation of low stratospheric ozone over Indian subcontinent and the work related to the model for forecasting the local time of clearance of fog. The Centre of global change and the South Asian Regional Research Centre of ICSU’s START programme for regional studies of global change which promote capacity building in the Indian region for coordinated multi-agency multi-disciplinary national and international programmes are still operated as a part of this Major Laboratory Project.

A Regional Facility on Radio Science (RFRS) started under the leadership of Late Dr.A.P.Mitra, FRS in Radio and Atmospheric Sciences Division with the objectives mainly to promote capacity building, particularly human resource and expertise development in the field of Radio Science and to disseminate nformation and coordinate the Radio Science related activities in India and around is also in operation.