KOZHIKODE: Prof Maruthi Akella, an alumnus of the National Institute of Technology Calicut (NITC) has received the honour of having an asteroid named after him. The Working Group on Small Bodies Nomenclature (WGSBN) of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) made the official announcement in its latest bulletin.
The IAU maintains custody for cataloguing and formal naming of all celestial objects. Asteroid 5376, a nearly five-plus-mile diameter minor planet that orbits around the Sun every 3.75 years, is now officially known as Maruthiakella.
A member of the asteroid main-belt between Mars and Jupiter, the minor planet was discovered by astronomers S Ueda and H Kaneda in 1990 from an observatory based in Kushiro, Japan. The orbit properties and physical characteristics for all main-belt asteroids, including 5376 Maruthiakella, can be accessed from the Nasa Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s small-body database.
An Indian-American aerospace engineer, Prof Akella holds the Cockrell Family Endowed Chair with the department of aerospace engineering and Engineering Mechanics at the University of Texas in Austin. After completing his BTech in mechanical engineering from NITC, he received master’s and doctoral degrees in aerospace engineering from the Indian Institute of Science and the Texas A&M University respectively.
Prof Akella’s research contributions led to many high-impact applications in space systems control and vision-guided robotics, including his team’s support for the Intuitive Machines IM-1 lunar landing mission guidance in February this year. In its announcement, IAU lauded Prof Akella for being “instrumental in advancing the control of complex dynamical systems with large-scale nonlinearities and uncertainties, contributing to many successful applications in astrodynamics.”
Prof Akella, an elected fellow of multiple professional bodies, is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Distinguished Alumni Award 2023 from NITC, formerly Regional Engineering College Calicut. He also holds leadership positions on technical committees and journal editorial boards.