In the news

Caught in the act: Indian Astronomers study a Rare Luminous Jet Spewed by a Supermassive Black Hole

December 2022

The GROWTH-India team obtained key data that helped in the identification and study of a rare, relativistic jetted tidal disruption event.

ASI New Discovery Award - Special mention

February 2021

GROWTH-India students Kritti Sharma (B.Tech. Mech, IIT Bombay), Kunal Deshmukh (B.Tech. MEMS, IIT Bombay), and Harsh Kumar (Ph.D. Physics, IIT Bombay) were given a special commendation and silver medals under the "ASI New Discovery Award" for the year 2021, for their work in discovering and studying asteroids.

Closest asteroid

August 2020

On August 16, an SUV-sized asteroid soared just 2950 km above the surface of Earth. IIT Bombay students Kunal Deshmukh and Kritti Sharma, working on a research project, discovered this object just hours later using data from the robotic Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) in California. Designated 2020 QG, it is the closest known asteroid to fly by Earth without impacting the planet. The previous known record-holder is asteroid 2011 CQ1, discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey in 2011, which passed above Earth about 1,550 miles (2,500 kilometers) higher than 2020 QG.