John Iman has 21+ Years in Global NDT & X-ray and is the president of ASNT. He is also the Vice President Global Sales at VMI, a Varex Imaging Company. He is a API Committee Member, Past NDTMA Chairman and AWS Member. Prior to VMI, john has worked for General Electric, Acuren Inspection and North Star Imaging

Dr. Tessy Thomas, Distinguished Scientist, has taken over as Director General (Aeronautical Systems) w.e.f 01-Jun-2018. She obtained her B.Tech in Electrical Engineering from Calicut University, ME in Guided Missiles from Institute of Armament Technology (now Defence Institute of Advanced Technology), Pune and PhD in Missile Guidance from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Hyderabad. She obtained MBA in Operations Management from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), New Delhi.
Dr. Tessy Thomas Joined IAT, Pune as a faculty member in Guided Missiles in the year 1986. She joined DRDL,Hyderabad in 1988. She was associated with Agni Programme right from its developmental flights. She has designed the guidance scheme for long range missile systems which is used in all Agni missiles. An energy management guidance scheme was designed and developed for the first time in the country for an all – solid propelled long range systems for which she was conferred with Agni self reliance award in the year 2001. She has contributed in various fields such as Guidance, Control, Inertial Navigation, Trajectory Simulation and Mission Design. She lead a major project AGNI-4 as Project Director, for a state-of-art system with many new technologies for the first time and successfully flight tested and proven. She was also Project Director (Mission) for the long range AGNI-5 system, which was successfully flight tested and proven. As Director, Advanced Systems Laboratory, DRDO, she held multi-dimensional roles and responsibilities and lead the development of strategic missile system from 2014 to 2018.
Dr. Tessy Thomas is the recipient of many prestigious awards including Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for Excellence in Public Administration Academics and Management-2012; DRDO Agni Award for Excellence in Self-Reliance – 2001; DRDO Award for Path breaking Research/Outstanding Technology Development-2007; DRDO Scientist of the Year Award-2008; DRDO Performance Excellence Award for Agni-4 in 2011; DRDO Performance Excellence Award for Agni-5 in 2012; Suman Sharma Award by The Institution of Engineers (India), National Design and Research Forum for Engineering Design in 2009; Madam Marie Curie Mahila Vijnana Puraskar-2012; Dr. Y. Nayudamma Memorial Award for the Year 2014 for Outstanding Contributions in the field Missile Technology, “Bharat Ratna Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya Award-2016” towards outstanding contributions in the field of Engineering towards design, development and realization of indigenous missile systems by The Institution of Engineers (India), Telangana State Centre, Hyderabad, “Distinguished Woman Scientist Award” in 2016 for her contributions in the field of Missile Technologyby Andhra Pradesh Science Congress, Andhra Pradesh Academy of Sciences.
Honoris Causa: -
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from IIT, Kanpur in 2019.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from Central University of Karnataka, Kalaburagi in 2018.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Agra in 2017.
• Doctor of Literature (Honoris Causa) from ITM University, Gwalior in 2016.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from Sri Padmavati Mahila Vishwavidyalaya University, Tirupathi in 2015.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from Hindustan University, Chennai in 2014.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) from Mangalayatan University, Aligarh in 2012.
• Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) in Space Science from Kalyani University, West Bengal in 2012.

Dr S. K. Jha is Chairman & Managing Director of MIDHANI. Before joining MIDHANI he has worked in Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) for more than 27 years & involved in technology development for processing of nuclear materials for India’s Nuclear Power program and strategic materials used in Missile, Space and Defense projects. He joined DAE after completing one-year training in Nuclear science and engineering from prestigious training school of Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC), Bombay.
In Atomic Energy he made number of technological innovations in processing of nuclear materials of different grades such as ‘difficult to hot work’ Alloy 718, Titan31, Titan-24, Titan44, Alloy 690 and Alloy 800H. He has carried out Simulation and modeling of two dissimilar metals used for development of fusion technology. He has also developed Titanium half alloy and full alloy tube in different sizes for Light Combat Aircraft and PSLV applications. He has invented a process to develop unique properties in pressure tube; a lifetime component for nuclear power reactors which has been used in India’s indigenously designed 700 MWe PHWRs.
In May 2020, when the entire world was going through a deep crisis, Dr. Jha took charge of MIDHANI Chairman & Managing Director. Due to his excellent leadership skills and strategic planning, MIDHANI achieved a remarkable all-round growth during FY 2020-21. Under his able stewardship, MIDHANI achieved its highest-ever turnover of Rs. 813 Cr. and highest-ever profit of Rs. 226 Cr. Also, MIDHANI achieved highest-ever export-turnover of Rs. 19 Cr. in FY 2020-21 in the midst of pandemic, which had disrupted entire supply-chain. Not only he has developed business in new areas for company but also made significant contributions in projects, which had been going since long. Under his leadership, MIDHANI has made tremendous progress in both Technological and commercial areas.
He is also a Life member of Indian institute of Metals, Indian Nuclear Society, ISNT and aeronautical Society of India. He has also co-authored report on materials for fast breeder reactor for IAEA (Vienna). He has also published more than 35 articles in international journals. He has completed his PhD in engineering sciences from Homi Bhabha National institute (HBNI), BARC. He is recipient of many awards and accolades. The most notable amongst them being, award for Excellence in Science technology for the year 2006 from Department of Atomic Energy (DAE). He has also received Group award from DAE five times for development of modified route for pressure tube, Development of Niobium alloys, Revamping of extrusion press, extrusion of ODS steel for FBRs application. Steam generator tubes for 700 MWe PHWRs. A list of his individual and group awards are given below:
Awards / Honours Received
1. Received award for Excellence in Science technology for the year 2006 from DAE
2. Received four times DAE Group awards for number of technological developments such as modified route for pressure tube, Development of Niobium alloys, revamping of extrusion press and extrusion of ODS steel for FBRs applications.
3. Sustainable & Balanced Business Performance Award to MIDHANI by SKOCH BSE Awards (2016).
4. Excellency Award to MIDHANI by Institute of Economic Studies (2016).
5. Corporate Vigilance Excellence Award for the year 2016-17 under “Metallurgy Sector” was conferred on MIDHANI in recognition of exemplary work done in the area of preventive vigilance.
6. MIDHANI was Conferred “GOLD Award” for “Corporate Excellence” by Skoch group (Highest Independent Honour in India) for the project “Modernization and Diversification of Products & Processes at MIDHANI”.
7. 6th Governance Now PSU Award in Non-Financial Category for ‘HR Excellence (Value Growth)’ was bestowed upon MIDHANI in Jan 2019 at New Delhi.
8. MIDHANI was awarded India’ Most Trusted Company 2019 by IBC Media USA in August 2019 at New Delhi.
9. MIDHANI was bestowed with FTCCI award under two categories; (1) Excellence in Industrial Productivity (2) Excellence in Research & Development in Jan 2021 at Hyderabad.
10. Dr S.K Jha, CMD, was conferred with IIM TATA Gold Medal by the Indian Institute of Metals on the occasion of 58th National Metallurgist Day and 74th Annual Technical Meeting 2020 in Feb 2021
11. MIDHANI received SKOCH Order of Merit and SKOCH Gold Award for “Modernization and Diversification of Product & Process at MIDHANI” under “Corporate Excellence” category during 71st SKOCH Summit in Feb 2021
12. Certificate of commitment was presented to MIDHANI for securing ‘4-star rating’ for commitment to EHS practice in the CII-SR-EHS Excellence awards in Mar 2021
13. MIDHANI conferred with the “Telangana State Intellectual Property Award” for the Best IP Portfolio in the PSU category by CII and Telangana State Global Linker in Apr 2021.

Prof X Maldague Electrical & Computing Engineering Department Sciences & Engineering Faculty University Laval, Quebec, Canada
Short bio:
Xavier Maldague, P. Eng., Ph. D., is full professor at the Department of Electrical and Computing Engineering of University Laval, Quebec City, Canada. He has trained over 50 graduate students (M.Sc. and Ph.D.). His research interests are in infrared thermography, NonDestructive Evaluation (NDE) techniques and vision systems for industrial inspection. He holds a Canada Research Chair in infrared vision. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Indian Society of Nondestructive Test-ing, a Fellow of the Canadian Engineering Institute, of the Canadian Institute for NonDestructive Evaluation, of the American Society of NonDestructive Testing, and from the Alexander von Humbolt Foundation (Germany). In 2019 he was bestowed an Doctor Honoris Causa in Infrared Thermography from University of Antwerp (Belgium).
Title of the talk is:
Dynamic Thermography Inspection of Structures using a Drone Based Approach: Review and Case studies
Short abstract:
In this talk the basic principles of dynamic thermography inspection of structures using drone will be discussed including benefits, challenges, case studies.
Case of aircrafts: Recent aircrafts incorporate and high content of composite materials such as Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) used in wings, fuselage, etc.
Such material require proper inspection to detect and assess severity of embedded defects present at manufacturing stages such as porosities and in-service defects (delaminations and disbonds)..
Since surfaces to inspect are large and time for inspection should be limited as much as possible, quick inspection schemes are preferred.
Other applications: Many other fields could benefit from drone inspection, for instance civil engineering in the case of large structures sometimes difficult and dangerous to reach.
In this talk, we present the well-known concepts of infrared thermography deployed in a dynamic scheme. Interestingly, adding visible channel could sometimes benefit the inspection with proper data fusion.
Drone inspection concepts are also discussed along approaches for thermogram processing based on deep learning.
Finally, a flying demonstrator is shown as well.

Shant Kenderian, PhD
Fellow of the American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT)
Materials Processing Department Director, The Aerospace Corporation, El Segundo, CA
Received PhD degree in Materials Science and Engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 2002. His studies were focused on advanced NDT methods for materials characterization and resulted in two US patents on using a laser-air hybrid ultrasonic technique for railroad inspection applications. He also holds a European patent in this field.
In the aftermath of the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, Dr. Kenderian joined the NASA Super Problem Resolution Team (SPRT), later became the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC). During the first two years, the SPRT engaged in an investigation to develop inspection methods for the External Tank (ET) Sprayed On Foam Insulation (SOFI) and a number of other tasks, which ultimately lead to the return to flight of the grounded shuttle program. In 2004, he held a Sr. Engineer position with Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and in 2005 he became a Member of the Technical Staff (MTS) with The Aerospace Corporation, where he is currently the Director for the Materials Processing Department. As a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC), The Aerospace Corporation is tasked to support the US Air Force space program, now the Space Force. The Materials Physics and NDE laboratory, under the Materials Processing Department, is equipped with a wide range of advanced NDT techniques and staffed with a strong team of experts. The team is routinely tasked with challenging problems, at times are deemed unsolvable, with a remarkable record of success.
Dr. Kenderian served six years on the board of directors of ASNT. He chaired several of ASNT committees, the Research Council, and a number of US and international symposia. He has been the recipient of corporate awards by The Aerospace Corporation, Lockheed Martin, and NASA. He is also the recipient of the ASNT Fellowship, Outstanding Paper, Research Council Innovation, Fellow, Mentoring, and Mehl Honor Lecture Awards.

Shant Kenderian, PE, PhD
Manager, Materials Physics & NDE Section
Materials Processing and Evaluation Department
The Aerospace Corporation, M2/248
2350 E. El Segundo Blvd.
El Segundo, CA 90245

e-mail: shant@aero.org
Telephone: (310) 336-0757

Arungalai Anbarasu is the Chief Technology & Strategy Officer at Waygate Technologies, a Baker Hughes Company driving strategy & innovation for the company. In addition to pushing the technology & business models boundaries on Inspection solutions, Aru and her team are also focused on the digital transformation of Waygate Technologies and spearheads Waygate Technologies’ evolution into a Digital Inspection Solutions provider, taking customers from inspections to insights and from insights to innovations. Prior to her current role, Aru was the General Manager for Industrial X-ray & CT solutions business at Waygate Technologies. She also spent over a decade in GE in multiple global impactful roles in business divisions such as Global Research Centre, Oil & Gas, Power Conversion, Healthcare and Renewables across the world. She is an official member of Forbes Technology Council and an influential thought leader. She is passionate about encouraging Women in STEM fields and continues to pursue avenues to support this topic. She was Recognized as Top 100 Technology Leaders by Technology Magazine, 50 Most Powerful Women in Technology by National Diversity Council and International Achievers’ Award, 2021 by Indian Achievers Award. Aru currently resides in Germany with her husband Divyang and daughter Ada.

Dr Chiraz Ennaceur is the CEO and co-founder of CorrosionRADAR Ltd (www.corrosionradar.com), one of the fastest growing companies in the UK in the space of predictive corrosion monitoring. CorrosionRADAR is an important enabler for Industry 4.0 and assets digitalisation allowing many sectors such as Oil & Gas and energy to have safer and more sustainable operations.

Dr. Kavitha Arunachalam received her Bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Communications Engineering from College of Engineering Guindy, Anna University (1994-1998), India and Doctoral degree in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University, East Lansing, USA (2002-2007). She was a post-doctoral research associate in the Hyperthermia Physics Division, Department of Radiation Oncology, Duke University Medical Center, USA from 2007-2010. She is a faculty in the Department of Engineering Design, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras since June 2010. Her research interests are hyperthermia physics, medical microwave radiometry, EM material measurements and non-destructive testing.

M.Menaka, a postgraduate in physics and has over 19 years of experience in the field of NDE for materials characterization. She has specialized in the areas of thermal imaging, image processing and Digital Radiography. She is presently Heading Radiation Application and Metrology Section at Radiological Safety Division of the Indira Gandhi Centre for Centre Research, Kalpakkam.
Her field of interests are Material Characterisation using thermal NDE and Thermal imaging as diagnostic tool in healthcare. She is an American Society for NDT certified Level – III in Infrared Thermal Testing. She has more than 50 publications in international and national journals and 45 publications in conferences. She has more than 319 citations for her credit. She has also contributed to the development of the first Indian standard on Infrared Thermal Testing which has been accepted by International Standard Organisation and is now under wide circulation.
She has won the best paper awards during the IIM NMD-ATM 2005 and NDE 2007. She has also won the best paper award in the R&D Category for the paper published in Journal of NDE. She is a receipient of the Group Achievement Award of Department Atomic Energy- for the year 2009. She has guided more than 10 engineering and science post graduate students in their projects.
She has been an active member of ISNT Kalpakkam Chapter for over 10 years and presently is the Joint Secretary of ISNT Kalpakkam Chapter and was a member of the technical committee of 14th APCNDT. She is a member of the QIRT Asia 2015 Steering Committee and has been a regular faculty for the Level – II and Level – III courses that have been conducted by ISNT Kalpakkam. She is one of the Board of Directors of American Society for Non-destructive Testing - India Section.

Dr. Aparna C. Sheila-Vadde is a Senior Engineer at the NDE Lab in GE Research, Bangalore. She has been with GE Research for more than 15 years and has worked on design and characterization of different electromagnetic sensors for inspection and monitoring applications in Aviation, Renewables and Oil and Gas Sectors. Prior to GE, Aparna worked at Western Digital Corp and Read-Rite, in Fremont, CA, USA for 3.5 years on GMR sensor design for hard-drives. Aparna has a Ph.D from Carnegie Mellon University, USA, MS from Indian Institute of Science and B.Tech from College of Engineering, Trivandrum, all in ECE.

Prof. Krishnan Balasubramaniam has been involved in the field of Non-destructive evaluation for more than Thirty years with applications in the fields of maintenance, quality assurance, manufacturing and design. His areas of research interests include Nondestructive evaluation, in-process monitoring, structural health monitoring, and applied data analysis. He is currently a Chair Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Dean for Industrial Consultancy and Sponsored Research at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, and also serves as the Head of the Centre for Nondestructive Evaluation which he founded in 2001.
He received his undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Madras (Regional Engineering College, Tiruchirapalli, India) in 1984. He then graduated from Drexel University with a M.S. degree in 1986 and a Ph.D. in the year 1989. Before joining IIT Madras in 2000, he was employed at Mississippi State University. He has over 400 technical publications (including 200 refereed journal papers), 16 patents filings and has directed 22 PHD student dissertations and 46 MS student theses.
In recognition for his outstanding contributions to research in the field of Nondestructive Evaluation, he was conferred with the ROY SHARPE PRIZE by the British Institute for NDT for the year 2012. He was also awarded the ISTEM Entrepreneurial Faculty Member Award for his entrepreneurial activities by Auburn University, USA in 2011 and the NATIONAL NDT AWARD 2010 by the Indian Society for NDT. He also was conferred the DRDO Academy Excellence Award for 2015. He has also been bestowed with the prestigious ABDUL KALAM National Technology Innovation Fellowship in 2018.
He has been instrumental in the incubation of several startups including Dhvani Research, Playns Technologies, Detect Technologies, Maximl Labs, Trotix Robotics, HyperVerge, and OP Tech and has jointly developed several new products through these companies.
He currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal for Nondestructive Evaluation (ISNT) and as the South-east Asia Editor for the Journal of Nondestructive Testing and Evaluation (Taylor and Francis). He also serves as the Associate Editor of Ultrasonics (Elsevier) and serves in the editorial board of the Journal of Structural Longevity (Techscience). He also is a board member of the World Federation of NDE Centers and the QNDE Scientific Advisor Committee.
He is a Life Fellow of the Academia NDT International, Life Fellow of the Indian Society of Nondestructive Testing (ISNT) and a Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineers.

Qualifications and Accreditations:
• B. E. Mechanical
• ASNT Level III (RT, PT, UT, MT, ET, LT, VT) – Certificate No. 60893
• ISO 9712 Level 3 (RT, PT, UT, MT)
• Senior Certified Welding Inspector (AWS)
• ISO 9000 Lead Assessor
• API 510 Pressure Vessel Inspector
• API 653 Aboveground storage Tank Inspector
• API 570 Authorized Piping Inspector
• API 571, API 577 & API 580 Authorized Inspector
• API 936 Refractory Practitioner
• API Tank Entry Supervisor
• API Source Inspector – Fixed Equipment
• API 1169 Pipeline Construction Inspector
Mr. Diwakar Joshi, [Director, Insight Quality Services (working in the field of Training, Consultancy, Inspection and NDT services) is basically a mechanical engineer having more than 45 years’ experience in QA/QC and NDT field. He has worked with prestigious organizations like Walchandnagar Industries Ltd., Alfa Laval India Ltd., PT. Puspetindo, Indonesia and PT. Balcke-Durr Indonesia.

He is a member of many institutes, like BINDT, AWS, ASNT, ASM, SWS, ISNT and NCB. He has many national and international papers to his credit and is currently the President Elect of Indian Society for Non-Destructive Testing (ISNT). Mr. Joshi is an approved member of ICNDT – WG1, (International Committee for Non-Destructive Testing – Working Group – 1) representing ISNT (Indian Society for Non-Destructive Testing) for Qualification and Certification.

He has hands-on Experience of Quality Control and Quality Assurance of Pressure Vessels and Heat Exchangers, ASME U, U2 and N (Nuclear) Stamp Vessels, in-service inspection of the refinery equipments, and is NDT Level III for reputed fabrication companies. He has also worked for shutdown inspection in Saudi Arabia and off-shore platform inspection in Middle East.
Has conducted training courses in India, Singapore, Bangkok (Thailand), Indonesia, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Trinidad and Tobago, UAE etc. and has trained and certified more than 10000 QA/QC Personnel, with over a 1000 training programs in various disciplines to his credit.
Presently, apart from Consultancy, Mr. Joshi is devoting major time in Training in the areas like API 510 / 653 / 570 / 580 / SIFE/ 577 / exams, AWS (CWI) exams, ASNT Level III exams, Train the Trainers and ASME Code Specific programs.
The following API Courses (more than 100 programs) are conducted for Qatar Petroleum, Aramco, Bapco, Reliance, IOCL and other refineries and also in Insight Quality Services in Pune and Chennai:

1) API 510 - Qatar Petroleum, Bapco, IOCL, Reliance, IQS
2) API 570 - Qatar Petroleum, Bapco, IOCL, Reliance, IQS
3) API 653 - Qatar Petroleum, Bapco, IOCL, Reliance, IQS, Aramco, Oman PDO
4) API 580 - Qatar Petroleum, IQS
5) API 571 - IQS, IGF, ADNOC
6) API 577 - IQS, IGF
7) API SIFE - IQS, IGF, M/s Stork (Trinidad and Tobago), OMIFCO (Oman) 8) Welding Inspection, QA/QC and Codes - Qatargas Operating Company Limited, Qatar
9) ASNT L-III Preparatory Training Programs - Indonesia, Thailand, UAE, Brunei, IQS, India

Insight Quality Services is accredited by NCB-ISNT, and has worked for almost all multinationals and corporate houses in India during its 25 years’ existence.

V.Manoharan is currently working as a Senior Scientist at GE Global Research center Bangalore since 2001. Prior to join GE, He worked as scientific officer at Advanced Fuel Fabrication Facility, Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC) and Division of Post Irradiation Examination and NDT development, Indira Gandhi Center for atomic research for 13 years. He has more than 30 years of experience in the field of Research in NDE.
He received National NDT award from Indian Society for Non-Destructive Testing for his contribution in NDE research.
He has completed his post graduate diploma in radiological physics from Bhabha Atomic research center and obtained Level-III certification in radiography, IR, UT, LPT and ECT from American Society for Nondestructive testing. His area of interest is Digital x-ray imaging, Positron annihilation spectroscopy, quantitative radiography Model based PoD , Applications of Micro and Nano x-ray computed tomography , Pipeline and pressure vessels integrity and Training in NDE.
He has more than 15 issued patents & patents applications and 30 technical publications in national and international journals & conferences

Dr. (Ms.) Sarmishtha Palit Sagar, has been involved in the field of Non-destructive evaluation for more than 20 years and is currently a Senior Principal Scientist and serves as the Head of the NDE & magnetic materials (MM) group at CSIR-National Metallurgical Laboratory, Jamshedpur. She has worked as a visiting Scientist at Fraunhofer Institute for Non-destructive Testing, Saarbreucken, Germany from 2000-2002 and researched on guided wave ultrasound under Prof J L Rose at Pennsylvania State University, USA in 2009. She has been elected as a member of the editorial board of the Korean Journal of NDE, selected as a member of the Technical committee of many international conferences like QIRT, APCNDT and World Conference on NDT. She has been awarded National NDT Award in “R&D” in the year 2005 and for “International Recognition” in 2017 by Indian Society for NDT. Institute of Engineers conferred on her the “Lady Engineer” award in the year 2012, Tata Innovista Regional Award in 2015 by Tata Groups. CSIR, India has awarded her Raman Research Fellowship award in 2008 to work at Pennsylvania State University.
She was invited as one of the key note speakers by Prof Jhang of Hanyang University, South Korea for the workshop on “Recent and future trends of non-linear ultrasonic”.
She is having 58 Publications in SCI and Non-SCI journals, 07 Patents and 05 copyrights in her credit. She has guided several Masters Students. Her experience in guiding research in NDE has seen her appointed to the Scientific Advisory Board of the prestigious European Project NOMAD under HORIZON 2020 in which 6 European Countries are involved.

Debasish Mishra obtained Ph.D from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur in 1998. He worked in the area of Laser Interferometric Tomography application to experimental heat transfer. He continued his research on various optical techniques for application to crystal growth research and structural engineering at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
He was a recipient of the prestigious Dr. K.S. Krishnan fellowship of the Department of Atomic Energy, Govt. of India from 1996 to 1998. He was also a recipient of the young scientist award from the Indian Science Congress Association in 1998.
Debasish joined General Electric Research and Development Center in 2003. He has been since then engaged with the digital radiography, optical and ultrasound inspection team working in a variety of NDT projects for GE businesses.
He has published more than 50 research papers in various international and national journals and conferences and 16 patent applications. Debasish also worked as a member of the ASTM E07 committee where he helps developing industrial radiography standards for inspection.

A Dual Degree graduate from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IITM - 2003, ME), Prabhu Rajagopal obtained his PhD in Ultrasonic Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) from Imperial College London, UK in 2007, where he also later had a 3-year stint as a Rolls-Royce funded Postdoc. Joining the Centre for NDE (CNDE) at the Machine Design Section of the Mechanical Engineering Department at IITM in December 2010, Dr. Rajagopal was promoted as full Professor in March 2019.
His research interests are in the inspection of structures under challenging conditions using robotic and waveguide sensing solutions and metamaterials, with over 20 industry/agency projects (USD3m), 165 technical articles and 18 filings and 1 granted Indian patent. His research is collaborative and international, with joint work with groups such as U.Nairobi Kenya, Swinburne UT Australia, NTU Singapore, ZUT Poland, Imperial College London and U. Warwick UK, U. Bordeaux France, MSU USA and ETS Montreal, Canada.
Passionate for tech-translation, Dr. Rajagopal has co-founded Startups including Planys and Solinas which deliver robotic inspections for submerged structural assets and more recently Xyma Analytics set to deliver Industrial IOT using waveguide sensors. Dr. Rajagopal's work on a robotic Septic Tank cleaning solution has also been discussed widely.
Dr. Rajagopal’s research is widely recognized through awards including theYoung NDT Scientist Award from ISNT, National Design Award from NDRF- Institution of Engineers (India), Institute R&D Award (Early Career) from IIT Madras and more recently, the prestigious National Swarnajayanti Fellowship Award from DST, Govt. India.
His work has also received coverage in prestigious national and international print/online media over the last few years (The Hindu, Buisinessline, ET, TOI, Deccan Chronicle, New Indian Express, NDTV, India Today, Yourstory, Better Indian, EdexLive, Asia Times).

Dr. Anish Kumar is heading Ultrasonic Measurements Section of NDE Division in Metallurgy and Materials Group at Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam. He obtained B.E. in Metallurgical Engineering from Bihar Institute of Technology, Sindri in 1996 and Ph.D from IIT, Kharagpur in 2005. In the past 22 years, he has been involved in development of innovative methodologies for ultrasonic inspection of nuclear components& structures and microstructural characterization in a wide range of alloy systems using acoustic &magnetic techniques. He worked as post-doctoral fellows at Fraunhofer Institute for NDT (IZFP), Germany (as Alexander von Humboldt fellow) and the University of Michigan, USA for one year each. He has over 150 publications to his credit including more than 100 publications in peer reviewed international journals. He is the recipient of Science & Technology Excellence Award (2015) from Dept. of Atomic Energy, National NDT Award in R&D (2015) from Indian Society for NDT (ISNT) and several young researcher/ scientist awards from various Indian and International societies, such as Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE), Indian National Science Academy (INSA), Indian Institute of Metals (IIM), The Minerals, Metals and Materials Society (TMS-USA), International Committee for NDT (ICNDT) and ISNT.

Chief Scientific Advisor, Azeriri Pvt Ltd, Chennai
Mentor, TeraLumen Solutions Ltd, Chennai
Technical Advisor, National Research and Design Forum
Chairman, National Certification Board -Indian Society of Nondestructive Testing (ISNT)
Former Principal Scientist / Quality & Innovation Leader at GE Global Research (2000 to 2020)
Former Senior Scientific Officer @IGCAR, Kalpakkam (1984 to 2000),
Certified Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, TRIZ Level 3 expert, ASNT NDT Level 3 (ET & MT).
A B.E (Metallurgy) from MS University Baroda and Ph.D from IIT, Kharagpur, he is a 36+ years experienced innovator, researcher, technologist and trainer with deep domain expertise in the multidisciplinary area of Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) of materials, components and structures as applied to Aerospace, Oil & Gas, Power, Renewables, Transportation and other industries. Passion to drive, lead and synergize between domains and adjacencies to enable best-in-class solutions using cutting edge technologies to industrial problems and challenges through collaborations, knowledge sharing and networking. Worked extensively in the development of new and Advanced NDE / Inspection techniques, driving the vision and prepared roadmaps for next generation. He loves exploring new domains and advanced technologies and has worked on some of the most advanced techniques in Electromagnetic, Ultrasound and Radiographic NDE, Automation and Robotics/Drones for Industrial Inspection for challenging applications in the industry.
He is currently mentoring, advising and incubating a few start-ups and pioneering the adoption of NDE 4.0 and Inspection through digital transformation (IoT, Digital Twins, AR/VR, Analytics using AI and ML, ….). He is passionate about Industry-Academia interactions and working towards enabling the same.
He has 12 patents and 160+ papers in various journals, books and proceedings and delivered 90+ invited talks. Received several prestigious awards like National NDT award for R&D, GE India’s JRD Tata award for excellence, GE Whitney award to name a few. He is an Honorary Fellow of ISNT and a Life Member of ASNT, MSI, AMSI, InSIS. He is on the Editorial Board of Journal of NDE – the quarterly journal from ISNT and a Reviewer for several journals including Experimental Techniques and others.

Dr Prafull Sharma currently serves as Chief Technology Officer of UK based CorrosionRADAR Ltd which is bringing innovative corrosion monitoring technologies using Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). CorrosionRADAR invented a predictive CUI monitoring system which is gaining global traction addressing a big issue for the industry. Prafull Sharma brings vast industrial experience specially in digitalisation of corrosion management on which there are several inventions to his credit. Prior to his current role, Prafull worked for General Electric R&D where he developed several sensing and NDT technologies. Prafull did his PhD from Cranfield University UK. He has over fifteen years experience in industrial technology development specially for asset integrity and automation in the Oil & Gas industry. He is also credited with over fifteen international patents and innovations.

Joined TWI INDIA On 1st JAN 2014 as Chief Manager / NDT, after successfully completing three and half decades of service at BHARAT HEAVY ELECTRICALS LTD TIRUCHIRAPALLI INDIA(BHEL).
*Holding Ph.D. degree in Structural Integrity and damage assessment of Engineering components, from a French University.
M.Tech Degree in NDT from National institute of Technology.
ASNT / ACCP /CSWIP LEVEL- 3 In RT, UT, MT, PT.
CSWIP Level 3 in UT, MT, PT, PAUT, TOFD, ECT and Digital Radiography from TWI UK.

. *Having over 40 years of experience in the field of Quality and NDE of Boilers, Pressure Vessels, Heat Exchangers, Nuclear Components, Valves, and defense equipment etc., during manufacturing and in-service inspection.
*Worked as General Manager and Headed a group of 150 NDT experts and inspection engineers catering to the need of a Boiler Plant with manufacturing capacity of 20000 MW.
*Having vast experience in Materials and processes involved in manufacturing of Thermal & Nuclear Power plant components.
*Developed and established several NDE techniques and procedures in accordance with the international codes and standards and customer specification.
*Had been responsible for training and certification of NDE Personnel.
*Developed and established special NDE techniques for RLA of power equipment
*Had been instrumental for introduction of several advanced NDE Technologies like Digital and Computed Radiography, Ultrasonic Phased Array technology, High Energy Radiography using Linear Accelerators, Micro focal radiography of critical nuclear components, Real time Radioscopy with Automatic Defect Recognition at BHEL.
*Contributed significantly to the Research in NDE.
*Published more than 150 technical papers in national and international journals/conferences. Guided several graduates and Post graduate students on NDE projects towards fulfillment of their Academic curriculums.

*Actively involved in promoting NDE Science and Technology through the professional Society, ISNT. served as the Hon. General Secretary of Indian Society of Nondestructive Testing (ISNT) Continuously NINE years and also served as PRESIDENT of ISNT between Dec 2018 to 2019 DEC.
*Served as a faculty member and examiner for M. Tech (NDT) course conducted by National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, India. Also, for Level -I&II courses organized by ISNT.

In recognition of significant contribution towards promotion of science and technology received many Awards at the National and International level which includes:
Honors and Awards:
*Bharat Vibhushan award-2016
*Swami Vivekanand Sandman Puraskar _2015
*Asia Pacific Achievers Award for Industry Development 2014
*Bharat Jyoti award 2013
*Glory of India Gold medal 2013.
*Man, of the year 2009 Awarded by American Biographical Institute, for outstanding community and professional achievement.
•International recognition award 2008 by ISNT.
•NDE Excellence award by ISNT Trichy chapter in 2008.
•International Engineer of the year 2008 awarded by International Biographical Centre, Cambridge, London.
•Inclusion of Biographical profile in “Marques Who’s who in Science and Engineering -2006-07”.
•BHEL Republic day award in 2005.
•BHEL Excellence award in quality in 2004.
•ISNT Award for best technical paper in JNDE 2001.
•ISNT Award for best technical paper in JNDE 2000.
•BHEL Republic day Award in 1995
•National NDT Award (Industrial applications) by ISNT in 1994.

Mr. Lennart Schulenburg is a NDE expert and Managing Director at the X-Ray innovator VisiConsult X-ray Systems & Solutions. With a degree in Computational Informatics and a MBA from Germanys top-business school, he successfully initiates insightful technology research and is a regular speaker at industry events to share the latest trends and innovations in NDE. His motto “It’s never a problem, rather a challenge” points clearly out his catching enthusiasm for the transformations driven by Industry 4.0. VisiConsult was founded in 1996 and is a leading supplier of DR and CT solutions to customers worldwide. This year VisiConsult opened an office in Pune to support valued Indian customers even better.

Raj Venkatachalam has been involved in the field of Non-destructive evaluation for more than 15 years and is currently a Senior Systems Engineer at VMI - A Varex Imaging Company.
Raj has a Master’s degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from University of Waterloo and a Bachelors in Electronics and Communication Engineering from University of Madras. He has several certifications in systems and reliability engineering.
At VMI, Raj is working on developing engineered solutions using Robotics and Analytical tools to enable next generation tools for Radiography. Prior to VMI, Raj worked as a Product Development Manager at Oceaneering International in Subsea Asset Integrity where he managed an engineering team to develop subsea inspection tools using Visual, EMAT, Digital Radiography and UT modalities. Prior to Oceaneering, Raj worked at General Electric for 12 years where he started his career as an entry level engineer. At GE, Raj was the global hardware engineering leader for all Digital Detector Array and Computed Radiography products. He enabled the launch of several new products for GE Inspection Technologies such as the wireless portable detectors, subsea detectors and computed radiography products
Raj is considered as a Subject Matter expert in the field of Digital Radiography and has close to 10 patents to his credit. He has conducted training to top approving agents in the aerospace industry as a part of the Metals Affordability Initiative (MAI) initiative for customers including the US Air force, Boeing, Pratt & Whitney, Rolls Royce and GE Aviation. Raj was one of the pioneers to successfully develop a flat panel based subsea detector that was demonstrated successfully to work under water up to a depth of 10,000ft. Raj has participated in several inspection related challenges and his solution for inspection of grouting on offshore wind turbines was declared as the winner in the Carbon Trust Offshore Wind Accelerator (“OWA”) competition. He also participated in the Technology challenge conducted by Petrobras in Brazil and his idea of developing a Flat panel based CT system for inspection of structures underwater was selected. He has a patent filed on this and the product is being developed now for deployment.

Dr. M. Phani Surya Kiran has received his Bachelor of Engineering Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Andhra University, Visakhapatnam in May 2001. After his graduation he pursued his masters at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at University of Missouri- Kansas City, U.S.A and graduated in Aug 2003. Further, in 2007, he obtained his Ph.D. degree from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, U.S.A with specialization on “Non-Destructive Characterization of Advanced Composites used in Aerospace and Defence Applications.” After couple of internship experiences at M/s Olson Engineering, Inc., Wheatridge, Colorado, USA working on "Applications of NDT in Concrete Industry", and M/s Intel Corporation, Chandler, Arizona working on "NDT applications for reliability in electronic industry", he has joined Defence Metallurgical Research Laboratory, in the year 2010. He is currently working as Scientist “E” in Non-Destructive Testing Group. His current research interests include, reliability assessment of NDT techniques for aerospace applications, modelling of NDT techniques, surface treatment techniques for beneficial residual stresses in aeroengine components and applications of residual stresses in life revision studies of aeroengine components, characterization of powder metallurgy based ceramic composite materials used for advanced armour and structural applications using advanced NDT Techniques. He has over 50 publications including various international journal papers, conference proceedings and presentations. In the year 2019, he has been awarded the laboratory scientist of the year.

Entrepreneur, physicist, trailblazer, consultant, author, speaker, and trainer with 15+ years experience in NDE and 20+ in data science. His work ranges from applied ultrasonic testing to quantum optics, from quality assurance to science, and from large-scale industries to start-ups. Some of the highlights of his work: Ph.D. on Induction Thermography, former Chairman of the Siemens NDE Council, and implementation of SAFT into serial production.
Dr. Vrana is leading multiple groups in national and international societies, mainly regarding NDE 4.0 and automated ultrasonic testing. He is well-published, editor of the Journal of NDE, editor-in-chief of the Handbook NDE 4.0, and received multiple awards.
His company “Vrana GmbH” specializes in NDE consulting and solutions, R&D, training, and software development. Vrana GmbH offers holistic cyber-physical solutions including IIoT integration, digital twin design, and value creation from data.

Iikka Virkkunen doctorated from Helsinki University of technology (now part of Aalto University) on 2001. He founded Trueflaw ltd. the same year, and has over 20 years of experience on working with NDT reliability. Trueflaw started out making cracks and cracked samples for NDT training and performance demonstration samples. Now the services include probability of detection (POD) services and automated flaw detection systems with machine learning (ML).
At the same time, Virkkunen continued academic contribution. He was nominated docent of Aalto University in 2007 and in 2015 was nominated Adjunct professor (part time). His research topics include NDT reliability, materials degradation, fatigue and residual stress measurements. He is currently focusing on development and adoption of machine learning for NDE.

• Indigenous Industrial Computed Tomography System capability developed at DRDL, Hyderabad with 4-axes, 6-axes mechanical manipulators, established performance evaluation as per ASTM E1441, performed reverse engineering for various missile sub-systems and characterized x-ray beam hardening.
• Established testing techniques using RT, UT, MT, PT, ET (Eddy Current Testing) and VT (Visual Testing) methods to establish integrity/ reliability and prevention of failure for various missile, aero-engine and marine engine hardware during raw material, fabrication and in-service conditions. Further studies on defect investigation and failure analysis also carried out towards root cause analysis. Updated and developed acceptance standards for inspection.
• Improved the reliability of inspection by procurement and establishment of 6-Axes Mechanical Manipulator, Industrial Videoscope, Film Digitizer, Digital Ultrasonic Flaw Detector, Eddy Current System, Ultrasonic Immersion System and other NDT facilities. Generated reference standards for customized inspection requirements as per international standards.
• As Team Leader of ISO cell, assisted Management Representative for implementation of Quality Management System in GTRE and for the successful up gradation of GTRE to ISO 9001:2015 and its sustainment through continuous recertification and surveillance audits.

Dr. Jyotirmayee Dash, founder and director of India’s first Terahertz company, TeraLumen Solutions Pvt. Ltd., has more than eight years of research, academic and entrepreneurial experience. An alma mater of one of the prestigious government engineering college in Odisha, Indira Gandhi Institute of Technology-Sarang and College of Engineering Guindy, Anna University-Chennai, Jyotirmayee completed her doctoral studies from CSIR (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research) -CEERI (Central Electronics Engineering Research Institute), Chennai in Terahertz technology. She was instrumental in setting up the first fully dedicated Terahertz laboratory in India at CSIR and has worked in several projects related to the technology. She has more than 24 publications in leading journals and international conference and proceedings, with 1 US patent granted and one provisional patent filed. Dr. Dash has now successfully developed the Terahertz device and is now working towards various industrial applications using this technology

Dr. Prabhat Munshi, retired Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, IIT Kanpur. His Specializations include Civilian nuclear safety analysis, Computerized tomography and its applications in medical imaging, multi-phase flow non-invasive measurements and non-destructive testing. He has more than 100 technical publications in referred journals. Contributed to books on 1. Computerized Tomography for Scientists and Engineers, CRC Press, 2007, 2. CT2008: Tomography Confluence American Institute of Physics, 2008 and 3. Climate Change and Tomography, Environmental Science and Engineering 2013, Springer, pp 183-187. Some of his major assignments are:
Measurement of void-fraction profiles in a steady-state bubbly flow regime using a scanning gamma-ray densitometer (Ohio State Univ )
Preparatory work for the self-study modules for control systems of nuclear power reactors (Ohio State Univ )
Simulation of transients/accidents for the nuclear power plants operated by Commonwealth Edison Company (Chicago)
Sobolev space error estimates for computerized tomography (Ph.D. thesis)
Experimental verification of the Sobolev space error estimates using the x-ray tomographic scanner developed at the Fraunhofer-Institute for Nondestructive Testing (Germany)
Analysis of hard biological tissues using the Si(Li) Tomographic scanner of the London Hospital Medical College
Tomographic imaging of a mercury-nitrogen flow system (BARC)
Performance Evaluation of a lab-scale x-ray CT scanner (DRDL)
Algorithms and Error Analysis for an industrial x-ray CT scanner (Fraunhofer IZFP)
Tomographic extension of ISRO macro-radiography system
Tomographic imaging of Aditya Tokamak plasma reactor
Analysis of X-ray micro-CT scanner (University of Manchester)
Analysis of a three-phase bubble column (Leibniz Universitatet Hannover)

Dr M. Arumugam is a Group Director, responsible for Quality Control and NDE of all materials and hardware used in various Liquid and Cryogenic engine propulsion systems. He is the Chairman of Inter- centre NDE Committee. In this capacity, he has contributed in resolving many critical issues by which the success of the mission was ensured. He has notable contributions in evolving the Specifications for India’s prestigious Gaganyaan mission. He played main role in Indigenisation of various metallic raw materials and Systems, more specifically Aluminium alloy products. He has generated many many NDT procedures and Acceptance criteria for Pressure vessels, Investment castings & Raw materials for satellite launch vehicle programme. He has served as an Expert member in “BrahMos” missile Attestation committee for Indigenisation of Materials. He has played a vital role in establishing world class QC and Inspection facilities at LPSC, more specifically in improving the NDE capabilities. He was awarded the National NDT Award for Excellence in NDT- Industries in 2015. In recognition to his outstanding contributions in Metallurgy and NDT, ISRO had awarded group awards in 2015, 2012 and 2009. He has over 3 decades of experience in aerospace materials and NDT. He has supported the faculty of Department of Metallurgy and Materials Engineering of NIT, Trichy and delivered lectures to cover the NDT portion of their curriculum for B.Tech, M.Tech and PhD students from 2014-2020.
He received his undergraduate degree in Metallurgical Engg from University of Madras (Govt. College of Engg,, Salem) in 1987. He the received his MS in 2012 from BITS, Pilani and PhD in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering in 2021 from National Institute of Technology, Trichirappalli. He has published more than 50 research papers in National, International Journals and Conferences.

Fellow of the American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT) Materials Processing Department Director, The Aerospace Corporation, El Segundo, CA
Received PhD degree in Materials Science and Engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 2002. His studies were focused on advanced NDT methods for materials characterization and resulted in two US patents on using a laser-air hybrid ultrasonic technique for railroad inspection applications. He also holds a European patent in this field.
In the aftermath of the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, Dr. Kenderian joined the NASA Super Problem Resolution Team (SPRT), later became the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC). During the first two years, the SPRT engaged in an investigation to develop inspection methods for the External Tank (ET) Sprayed On Foam Insulation (SOFI) and a number of other tasks, which ultimately lead to the return to flight of the grounded shuttle program. In 2004, he held a Sr. Engineer position with Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and in 2005 he became a Member of the Technical Staff (MTS) with The Aerospace Corporation, where he is currently the Director for the Materials Processing Department. As a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC), The Aerospace Corporation is tasked to support the US Air Force space program, now the Space Force. The Materials Physics and NDE laboratory, under the Materials Processing Department, is equipped with a wide range of advanced NDT techniques and staffed with a strong team of experts. The team is routinely tasked with challenging problems, at times are deemed unsolvable, with a remarkable record of success.
Dr. Kenderian served six years on the board of directors of ASNT. He chaired several of ASNT committees, the Research Council, and a number of US and international symposia. He has been the recipient of corporate awards by The Aerospace Corporation, Lockheed Martin, and NASA. He is also the recipient of the ASNT Fellowship, Outstanding Paper, Research Council Innovation, Fellow, Mentoring, and Mehl Honor Lecture Awards.
*******************
Shant Kenderian, PE, PhD
Manager, Materials Physics & NDE Section
Materials Processing and Evaluation Department
The Aerospace Corporation, M2/248
2350 E. El Segundo Blvd.
El Segundo, CA 90245
e-mail: shant@aero.org
Telephone: (310) 336-0757

Christian Els is one of the co-founders and managing director of the sentin GmbH. A company that has focused on the automation of image interpretation using AI in NDE. Christian is a mechanical engineer and co-founded sentin after years in the Bosch group working on data driven business models in traditional industries. He is vice chairman of the AI working group of the DGZFP and a regular speaker at the DGQ (German Quality Society), DGZFP or various international NDT conferences on topics of AI, Digital Transformation and Entrepreneurship.

Christian Boller holds a chair in Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) and Quality Assurance at Saarland University in Saarbrücken/Germany. From 2008 to 2020 he was also a director of the Fraunhofer Institute of Non-Destructive Testing based in Saarbrücken and Dresden/Germany. He received an engineering diploma in structural (civil) engineering from Darmstadt Technical University as well as an engineering doctoral degree in material mechanics from the same institution. He held various posts in research and development with Battelle, MBB, Daimler-Benz and EADS in Frankfurt/Main, Ottobunn/Munich and Stuttgart respectively, before being appointed a chair in smart structural design at the University of Sheffield/UK in 2003. In 2013 Professor Boller launched and became the director of the NDT Master Course at Dresden International University (DIU), an an-institute of Dresden Technical University. He is also a visiting professor at the Nanjing University for Aeronautics and Astronautics (NUAA) since 2014, a member of various scientific committees and societies and has published and edited a multitude of articles and books in the area of fatigue and fracture, smart structures, structural health monitoring, micro aerial vehicles and non-destructive testing, including ‘Materials Data for Cyclic Loading’ and the ‘Encyclopedia on Structural Health Monitoring’. Since 2010 he is a main organizer of the annual International Symposium on NDT in Aerospace taking place at aerospace related locations all around the globe.

Vanita Arora received the Ph.D. degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Ropar (IIT Ropar), India. She is presently working as a faculty member at Indian Institute of Information Technology Una, Transit Campus-II: Vill. Chandpur, Teh. Haroli, Distt. Una, Himachal Pradesh-India. Her research interests include the development of infrared imaging technologies for non-invasive/nondestructive testing applications. She serves as a guest editor for several refereed journals.

Dr. Saptarshi Mukherjee received the B.Tech. degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering from the National Institute of Technology, Durgapur, India, in 2013, and the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA, in 2018. He joined as a Postdoctoral Research Staff member and is currently working as an Applied Electromagnetics Research Scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Dr. Mukherjee’s research interests include electromagnetic nondestructive evaluation methods in advanced manufacturing, computational geosciences, imaging and inverse problems and highpower microwave devices. He has authored 1 patent and over 20 technical papers. He is currently serving as an American Society for Nondestructive Testing (ASNT) mentor, committee member of ASNT research and engineering councils, and current chair for ASNT Golden Gate Section. He has also served as the chair of the Electromagnetic Nondestructive Evaluation workshop, a session chair for 8 international conferences and a reviewer of overall 23 scientific journals. He received the National Science Foundation International Research Fellowship in 2015, ASNT Graduate Fellowship award in 2017, ASNT Travel Grant award in 2018 and the Atmospheric Earth & Energy Sciences Directorate (LLNL) stand-out award in 2021

Dr. Daniel Kanzler is working in the area of reliability evaluation of non-destructive testing systems for over 15 years.
He started his career at GE Sensing and Inspection Technologies in the field of ultrasonic testing. During this time, he completed his diploma and master thesis. Later on, he changed jobs and started working at the Federal Institute of Material Testing and Research, Berlin. He was part of the Radiology department, where he finished his PhD in 2016.
Different publications, his diploma as well as his master and PhD thesis considered different perspectives of testing systems in the field of ultrasonic testing, radiographic testing, visual testing and eddy current testing. One of his accomplished goals have been the probabilistic evaluation due to realistic defects with multiparametric influence analyses and the inclusion of economical KPIs.
He holds the NDT Master degree with certified three “level 3” in ultrasonic, radiographic and eddy current testing (ISO 9712).
In 2012, he started working as a lecturer of DGZfP (German Society of Non-destructive Testing), for different universities (e.g. at TU Munich and TH Aschaffenburg) as well as being a tutor for the European American Workshop on reliability of NDT.
Currently he is developing a new standard in the reliability and new approaches for the future of NDE (NDE4.0) in Germany and in Europe.
Furthermore, the project he started with a group of other experts, is working together with different industrial sectors to introduce reliability concepts for meaningful use of NDT. Since 2017, he is also leading the ICNDT specialist group on NDT Reliability.

C.V.Krishnamurthy is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Physics at IIT Madras and is also affiliated to the Centre for Nondestructive Evaluation (CNDE) at IIT Madras. He obtained his PhD from IIT Madras in 1989. In the past, he had participated in contract research for the Indian Navy developing and delivering a product for on-board tactical use of RADARs. While at CNDE, he developed quantitative ultrasonic transducer models and had participated in the ultrasound benchmark problems set by the World Federation of NDE Centers. He has developed a computed point spread function approach for ultrasonic imaging applications. He has supervised the development of ray-tracing models and FDTD models for ultrasound propagation which has formed the basis for a commercial product that is currently available. He is currently the Principal Investigator or Co-Principal Investigator in several research projects funded by DST, DAE, ADA, ISRO and DRDO organizations. He was involved in the IGCAR funded project on the development of an Under-Sodium Imaging scheme for reactor vessel inspection. With BRNS funding, he has initiated the development of quantitative models to characterize elastic wave propagation and heat diffusion in polycrystalline metals and heterogenous media. As a Co-PI of the Indo-German program, AMPLAST, he is currently involved in the development of non-contact techniques for determination of temperature and emissivity of materials at high temperatures using infrared radiation. The on-going project with ASL (DRDO) involves the development of capacitance imaging and free space technique for material characterization. He has co-guided an MS thesis on new designs for ground penetrating radar as part of interdisciplinary program at IIT Madras.
His current research focus is in the development of experimental and computational techniques for electromagnetic nondestructive evaluation of material and defect characteristics. He actively collaborates with the Department of Engineering Design on the development of electromagnetic non-destructive evaluation techniques.
He has written a series of articles on advanced non-destructive imaging techniques under the feature HORIZON for the Journal for Nondestructive Evaluation (ISNT).
He has over 120 technical publications and has presented papers at several national and international conferences.
He is a Life Fellow of the Indian Society of Nondestructive Testing (ISNT).
He is a co-recipient of prestigious DRDO Academy Excellence Award for ‘Outstanding and Internationally recognized contribution in the field of NDT in collaboration with DRDO Laboratories leading to innovative and implementable products for DRDO Stakeholders’ as Head, Center for Nondestructive Evaluation, IIT Madras (Award for year 2015, received in April 2017).

U Anand is the Head – Reliability of Static Equipment at Reliance Industries Limited.
A graduate in Science from University of Chennai followed by graduation in Metallurgical engineering from Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru.
Close to 30 years of experience in managing the integrity of assets in large to very large Petrochemical and Refineries.
He has a deep understanding of design of static equipment and degradation mechanisms in typical refinery and Petrochemical plants. He has vast experience in application of conventional and advanced NDE’s for in service inspection of assets. He also drives development of new and advanced NDE methods by collaborating with academia and Industry. He has a vision to bring in the next generation technology in NDE for process plants that will be on-line and real time.

Dr. Umesh Kumar is at present Head of Industrial Tomography and Instrumentation Section at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Mumbai. He joined BARC in 1989 after successfully completing one-year OCES (Physics) programme of BARC Training School. He obtained his Ph.D. (Sc) from the University of Mumbai in 2004. He has almost thirty years of experience in research and development activities in radiation and radioisotope based imaging and computed tomography for industrial applications. His research interests include nuclear radiation-based industrial radiology, digital radiography and computed tomography for Non-destructive Testing and Evaluation (NDT&E). Dr. Umesh Kumar has been awarded the DAE Scientific and Technical Excellence Award 2007 for his contributions in the field of advanced nuclear imaging for industrial applications. He is also recipient of the NDT Achievement Award (Research and Development) 2009 by the Indian Society for Non-Destructive Testing, ISNT (Mumbai).
He has served as the National Project Coordinator (NPC, India) and Lead Country Coordinator (LCC) for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) coordinated Projects in the Asia-Pacific (RCA) Region on advanced digital imaging techniques and industrial computed tomography. He has also served as an international expert for the Technical Cooperation (TC) Evaluation of TC Equipment in Brazil for the Agency and as an instructor for the IAEA Regional Training Course (RTC) in industrial applications of advanced radiation based imaging held at KAERI, South Korea. He has been Course Director for two IAEA Regional Training Programmes held in India on DR&CT for international participants and also conducted a national workshop on digital imaging which was organized by the Indian Nuclear Society. Dr. Umesh Kumar was one of the international speakers invited by the IAEA to deliver a technical talk on Computed Tomography for Industry – Needs and Status, at the Scientific Forum held during the General Conference in September 2015 at IAEA HQ, Vienna, Austria.
He is a life member of Indian Society for Non-destructive testing (ISNT), National Association for Applications of Radioisotopes and Radiation in Industry (NAARRI) and Indian Nuclear Society (INS).

Dr. Avinash Uddhav Sonawane joined the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) in 1987 after his completion of Post-Graduation in Physics from the Department of Physics, University of Pune. He obtained his Ph.D on the topic “Patient Protection in Diagnostic Radiology” from the University of Mumbai. He is presently designated as Secretary to the Board and Head of the Directorate of Regulatory Affairs & Communications (DRA&C) of AERB.
Dr. Sonawane is a recipient of the Gold Medal of Indian Nuclear Society (INS) for his significant and outstanding contribution in establishing and streamlining regulatory framework for ensuring safe usages of radiation sources for societal benefits in the country..He has been honoured by ISNT, Mumbai Chapter with NDT Achievement Award -2013 for Training/Education. He has been empanelled as Assessor by the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Healthcare Providers (NABH), Quality Council of India (QCI) for Medical Imaging Services (MIS).
He is the national Point of Contact (PoC) in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Vienna, for the safety and security of radiation sources and Incident & Trafficking Data Base (ITDB) Programm of IAEA.

Prof. Gopalakrishnan received his Master’s Degree in Engineering Mechanics from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, Chennai and Ph.D from School of Aeronautics and Astronautics from Purdue University, USA in the year December 1992. Before proceeding for USA for his doctoral studies, Prof. Gopalakrishnan briefly worked at NAL Bangalore in the Structures Division. After his Ph.D., he was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the department of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. In the year November 1997, he joined the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, where currently he is the KSIIDC Chair Professor. His main areas of interest are Wave Propagation in complex media, Computational Mechanics, Smart Structures, Structural Health Monitoring, MEMS and Nano Composite Structures. Prof. Gopalakrishnan has extensively published his work on many top rated international journals. He has a total of 216 international journal papers, 6 graduate level textbooks, two undergraduate books, 13 book chapters, and 160 international conference papers. He has an h-index of 48 in Google scholar with nearly 8700 citations, which is highest in India for any researchers in Aerospace domain. He is in the editorial board of 6 international journals and is the Associate editor for Smart Materials and Structures and Structural Health Monitoring international journals. Prof. Gopalakrishnan is decorated with many awards and honors, which include, International Structural Health Monitoring person of the year awards 2016 instituted by SAGE Publications, Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering, Fellow of Indian Academy of Sciences, Associate Fellows AIAA, Distinguished Alumnus Award, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, Chennai, Satish Dhawan Young Scientist Award by Government of Karnataka, Biren Roy Trust award of Aeronautical society of India, Alumni Award of excellence in research at IISc in the year 2013 and the Royal Academy of Engineering, UK Distinguished visiting Fellowship. Recently He was elected Fellow of Institute of Mechanical Engineers, UK.
Prof. Gopalakrishnan is one of the highly cited Aerospace researchers in the country. His notable contribution is in popularizing Spectral Finite Element as an analysis tool for wave propagation in complex media and wave propagation based modeling tool for Structural Health Monitoring. Prof. Gopalakrishnan was the head of the Aerospace Project assessment and Review Committee of The National Programme of Micro and Smart Systems (NPMASS), DRDO, Government of India, where he was responsible for delivering many micro devices required for many aircraft/spacecraft and missile platform of the country. He was also a member of the Structures panel of the Aeronautical Research & Development Board, Government of India, and the President of Institute for Smart Structures and Systems. He was also the member of NAL RC between 2013-2015. He has attracted research funding from top Aerospace Companies, which include Being Aircraft Company, Pratt & Whitney Corporation, USA, Office of Naval research, USA, Air force office for Advanced Research, Tokyo, and the Aeronautical Research and Development Board. Within the IISc, he has held various administrative positions. He was the Chair of Department of Aerospace Engineering (2015-2019), Associate Chairman for Center for Scientific and industrial Consultancy and was the founder Chairman of Intellectual Property cell. He was also a Resource Executive at Society for Innovation and Development (2003-2018) and currently, he is the convener for the Pratt & Whitney Center at IISc. He has guided 27 Ph.D’s, 7M.Tech (Research) and 23 M.E students.

Brief Biodata: Geetika Dua received the Ph.D. degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Ropar (IIT Ropar), India. She is currently working with the Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology, Patiala, Punjab, India. She serves as a Guest Editor for several refereed journals. Her major areas of research interest are the development of signal, image, and video processing methods for nondestructive testing/noninvasive imaging modalities for inspection of various industrial and biomedical materials.