Up In The Air

IISc’s second campus at Challakere provides an ideal locale to study aerosols and their impact on climate   Travelling down the National Highway from Bangalore to Challakere in the Chitradurga district of Karnataka, and past the city limits, I noticed the air becoming fresher to breathe. Could it have been because of the reduced pollution, […]

An Uphill Battle

Researchers, doctors and communities work together to manage a neglected disease   The first time Nagendra Kumar P started experiencing extreme pain was when he was a toddler. “He had severe headaches,” says his father, B Pandegowda. “We showed him to small hospitals nearby. He would become better for a few days, but the headaches […]

Blowin’ in the Wind

The influence of wind currents on humans and non-humans   Chennai. 13 December 2016. I woke up in the morning and headed to the tea stall nearby for my daily dose of morning chai. It was windier than usual: my outfit ruffled heavily, and the umbrella I was carrying to protect me from the drizzle […]

Can Solid Tissues Flow?

Cells can apply and sense forces to communicate and coordinate with each other. Scientists and engineers have teamed up under the mechanobiology banner to study these cellular forces   The outermost and the innermost surfaces of any organ are lined by the ‘epithelium’, a tissue composed of cells arranged in a sheet. For instance, the […]

From Boon to Bane: The Changing Face of Assam’s Floods

With each passing year, floods in Assam have become increasingly catastrophic, driven by a combination of socio-political factors and climate change   The Udalguri district in Assam, which shares an international border with Bhutan, has historically been an area largely unaffected by extreme climate. But in recent times, this district, like many others across the […]

In Search of Drinking Water

Researchers at IISc are working on innovative solutions to improve water quality   In August 2011, K Kesava Rao, Professor at the Department of Chemical Engineering, visited the village of Yellampalli, about 100 km north of Bangalore. The residents of the village were faced with a huge problem: water scarcity. To make matters worse, the […]