New Delhi/IBNS: The Centre on Tuesday appointed V Narayanan as the new chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation and secretary, Department of Space.

Narayanan will take over from the current chairman S Somanath on January 14.

In a notification on Tuesday, the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet said Narayanan, who is the head of the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC), Valiamala, will have a tenure of two years.

Narayanan is a distinguished scientist (APEX Scale) and senior director at ISRO.

He heads the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre, which is engaged in the development of liquid, semi cryogenic and cryogenic propulsion stages for launch vehicles, chemical and electric propulsion systems for satellites, control systems for launch vehicles, and transducers development for space systems health monitoring.

He is also the chairman of the Project Management Council-Space Transportation System (PMC-STS), the decision-making body in all launch vehicle projects and programmes, and the chairman of the National Level Human Rated Certification Board (HRCB) for Gaganyaan, India's planned human spaceflight mission.