The Department of Aerospace Engineering is in the process of restoring its plane exhibits In 2004, the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics at Trieste, Italy, published a book titled One Hundred Reasons to be a Scientist. One of the contributors to the book was Roddam Narasimha, whose article, How I Became a […]
Experiencing the outdoors with the Nature Club On a surprisingly pleasant Sunday morning in mid-April, a carpet of bright yellow copperpod flowers greets visitors at the parking lot near the main entrance of IISc. Among them are participants of the “Butterfly Walk”, organised by the Nature Club of the Institute. They make their way […]
The Photography Club is a forum for students to learn the craft from their peers During the orientation programme marking the start of the 2012–13 academic year at the Department of Computer Science and Automation (CSA), faculty member Chiranjib Bhattacharyya spoke to the incoming PhD students. In the course of this interaction, he told […]
When Sunanda Vinayachandran came to Bangalore, she joined the Department of Biotechnology at St Joseph’s College as a faculty member, a department which she also headed for a few years. She had then just moved to the campus of IISc with her husband, PN Vinayachandran, Professor at the Centre for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. Sunanda, […]
Scientists from IISc are addressing questions about the biological world using their engineering skills Most mechanical engineers do what we think they do – design and fabricate aircraft, machines, and other such human-made objects. But it turns out that some members of their tribe are also curious about how living things work. One of […]
The first head of the Department of Biochemistry was one of the most consequential researchers of his time Gilbert John Fowler wore many scientific hats: he was a chemist, a biologist and an environmental scientist – decades before environmental science became an active field of scientific investigation. He even fancied himself as an economist. […]
IISc’s neighbourhood has a long and rich history In the late 1890s, JN Tata was hunting for a suitable location for what eventually came to be known as the Indian Institute of Science (IISc). By the early 1900s, Bangalore had become the frontrunner to host the research institute, not least because of the wholehearted support […]
11 December 2019 marks the 137th birth anniversary of Max Born, who came to IISc on CV Raman’s invitation The Mysterious Number 137 was the title of a lecture that Max Born delivered to the South Indian Science Association in Bangalore on 7 November 1935. Called the fine structure constant α, 137 is a dimensionless […]
Studying how a changing monsoon could affect our biodiversity Scientists predict that the current bout of climate change, induced by human activities, will severely impact the monsoon. How will the expected change in this weather system affect India’s rich biological diversity? Given the complexity of both the monsoon and anthropogenic climate change, the answer is […]
The State of Mysore played a crucial role in helping establish IISc and influenced its research in the years that followed “Mysore is the best administered state in the world,” John Sankey, the Lord Chancellor of Great Britain and a human rights activist, is said to have declared during the first Round Table Conference in […]
