Mumbai: India's top atomic scientist on Tuesday urged government to create better facilities at centres like the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre to attract younger students and visiting scientists and to encourage research in nuclear studies and related subjects.

The number of students and visiting scientists for research in fields like nuclear studies in the country had been small so far and in this context moves had been made to create facilities to accommodate them at BARC, Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Anil Kakodkar said today.

"This will give a boost to scientific research and neutron-based research," Kakodkar said while inaugurating an International Symposium on Neutron Scattering at BARC.

"We were close to setting up a reactor in a university here but had to back off due to constraints, which we need to overcome," he said.

The presence of a nuclear reactor in a university would increase access to research in the subjects like nuclear sciences which could attract more students, he said.

Speaking on the need for self-reliance of research institutes, Kakodkar said it was important for researchers to help build scientific experimental facilities.

"Unless we are able to build our own experimental facilities we end up working on ideas that can be done on existing facilities and leave out those which require us to build our own equipment," he said.

Kakodkar also stressed the importance of international links and collaborations between institutes like BARC and foreign counterparts saying it helped in improving the scientific facilities Indian scientists had

"These collaborations would result in a larger number of younger people being involved in scientific projects and can be utilised to create attraction for younger researchers to get into scientific research," Kakodkar, who is also secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy, said.

He pointed out that presently there was a global problem in attracting young students to nuclear research.

Kakodkar also praised the neutron scattering scientists of the country who were at the forefront of self-reliance in terms of scientific instruments.

The three-day-long symposium is to be held till January 18 and will feature about 100 papers being presented on neutron scattering by specialists from India and abroad.

Eminent scientist Dr G Venkataraman, who was also present at the innauguration, sought that a large neutron source be built in Indore which could cater to the needs of the African and Asian region.

He proposed the creation of centre for scientific research to facilitate greater studies in inter-disciplinary topics.

Teachers from universities should take a greater role in scientific research and experts from the industrial sector should also be allowed to participate in research projects along with government scientists to ensure that all available talent is utilised to the fullest, Venkataraman said.

Source : DNAIndia