Scientist Dr. Samir V Kamat will lead the Department of Defence Research & Development as Secretary and as Chairman of the DRDO (Defence Research and Development Organization). The appointment committee is appointing him.
Following a Personnel Ministry order, Kamat, the current Director-General, Naval Systems & Materials (NS&M), would take over for G Satheesh Reddy, who has been nominated as scientific adviser to Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.
DRDO is the research and development arm of the Defence Ministry, India. From the date of his assumption of the office until he reaches the age of 60, Kamat’s appointment has been confirmed by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC).
Dr. Kamat graduated from IIT-Kharagpur with a BTech (Hons) in Metallurgical Engineering in 1985 and did his Ph.D. from Ohio State University in Materials Science & Engineering in 1988. In 1989, he started working for DRDO at DMRL in Hyderabad. As of 2015, he has been the lab’s director. In 2017, Kamat became Director of NS&M. Kamat has made significant contributions to the field of microstructure-mechanical property correlations in advanced materials over the past quarter century. These materials include ceramic matrix composites, aluminum-lithium alloys, high-strength aluminum alloys, & titanium alloys, all of which have found uses in the defense industry.
He is an expert in characterizing the mechanical behavior of materials in low volumes, particularly those utilized in MEMS, & has been influential in establishing cutting-edge experimental facilities.
Kamat has received numerous accolades for his technical contributions, including the Indranil Medal from the Mining, Geological, & Metallurgical Institute of India in 1986, the DRDO Young Scientist Award in 1998, the Binani Gold Medal (jointly) of the Indian Institute of Metals in 2006, the National Metallurgists’ Day Metallurgist of the Year Award from the Ministry of Steel in 2008, the National Science Day Oration Silicon Medal from the Silicon Valley Academy of Science in 2009,
