Professor Annapurni Subramaniam has become the first Indian woman to receive the COSPAR Vikram Sarabhai Medal, one of the major international honours for contributions to space research in developing countries.The award was presented during the 46th COSPAR Scientific Assembly in Florence, Italy, in August 2026.
Subramaniam, Director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, is also the fourth Indian to receive the medal.Subramaniam is an astrophysicist with more than three decades of research experience.
The telescope’s observations have supported research into stars, star clusters, galaxies and other astronomical objects.Subramaniam’s work has continued beyond AstroSat.
The medal is jointly associated with COSPAR and ISRO and honours Vikram Sarabhai, one of the architects of India’s space programme.Subramaniam is the fourth Indian recipient.
Rao in 1996, Gurbax Singh Lakhina in 2014 and Anil Bhardwaj in 2024.The COSPAR medal is not her first major national recognition.
Professor Annapurni Subramaniam has become the first Indian woman to receive the COSPAR Vikram Sarabhai Medal, one of the major international honours for contributions to space research in developing countries.The award was presented during the 46th COSPAR Scientific Assembly in Florence, Italy, in August 2026. Subramaniam, Director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, is also the fourth Indian to receive the medal.Subramaniam is an astrophysicist with more than three decades of research experience. Her work spans star clusters, stellar populations, galaxies, ultraviolet astronomy and the Magellanic Clouds. According to the IIA, she has around 175 research publications and has guided 15 PhD students.She became the first woman to head the Indian Institute of Astrophysics when she took over as director in 2019. Her research has focused on understanding stellar populations and their evolution, including work on blue stragglers, globular and open clusters, nearby galaxies and the Magellanic Clouds.One of Subramaniam’s key contributions has been to AstroSat, India’s first dedicated multi-wavelength space observatory. She served as the calibration scientist for the Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (UVIT) on AstroSat and led its in-orbit performance verification.UVIT allows scientists to study celestial objects at ultraviolet wavelengths that are difficult to observe from Earth due to atmospheric absorption. The telescope’s observations have supported research into stars, star clusters, galaxies and other astronomical objects.Subramaniam’s work has continued beyond AstroSat. She is the Principal Investigator of INSIST, a proposed next-generation ultraviolet-optical space telescope that builds on the experience gained through AstroSat and UVIT. She has also contributed to India’s participation in the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) project, an international effort to build a powerful ground-based optical and infrared telescope.The COSPAR Vikram Sarabhai Medal is awarded every two years for outstanding contributions to space research in developing countries. The medal is jointly associated with COSPAR and ISRO and honours Vikram Sarabhai, one of the architects of India’s space programme.Subramaniam is the fourth Indian recipient. Before her, the medal went to U.R. Rao in 1996, Gurbax Singh Lakhina in 2014 and Anil Bhardwaj in 2024.The COSPAR medal is not her first major national recognition. In 2024, Subramaniam received the Rashtriya Vigyan Puraskar Vigyan Shri in Space Science and Technology.The award recognised her work on stars, blue stragglers, star clusters, star formation, galactic structure, and the Magellanic Clouds, as well as her contributions to AstroSat and ultraviolet astronomy.Subramaniam’s latest recognition puts her among a small group of Indian scientists honoured with the COSPAR Vikram Sarabhai Medal and makes her the first Indian woman to receive it.
