Hyderabad, January 25, 2006 (TOI)

India is developing a new hypersonic jet propulsion system to enable its space shuttle launchers travel at Mach 8 speed.

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) are currently working on the system and ground tests are already underway.

"Isro has successfully tested the ability of the new hypersonic system in the laboratory, but it will take some more time to bring the technology into use,"M Natarajan, scientific advisor to the defence ministry, said here on Tuesday.

Natarajan was speaking on the sidelines of a seminar on ‘Technological challenges in hypersonic systems and reusable launch vehicles’ organised jointly by the Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) and the Astronautical Society of India (ASI).

He said the DRDO was building a small launch vehicle with hypersonic system for the Isro, which will be tested at 30 km altitude at a speed of Mach 8.

"The system is going through ground tests and it will take three years for testing it on a launch vehicle,"he said.

Isro chairman G Madhavan Nair said they had tested a similar propulsion system in their laboratories. "Isro tested the system successfully at a speed of Mach 7 for seven seconds,"he said.

Isro is also planning to attach the system to a conventional rocket and demonstrate its performance, Nair said.

Outlining DRDO’s achievements in 2005 Natarajan said the problem of warheads in the Nag missile has been resolved. Similarly, Agni-III is ready for trials but is awaiting government’s nod.