The alluring mystery of an amorphous solid Glass is everywhere. You scroll over it on your phone, you drink from it, it’s in the spectacles perched on your nose and in the windows of your house. But how does it form? To picture that, imagine molten glass. As a liquid, it can flow; its […]
How citizens are helping collect research data On the rare occasion that you break away from the tedium of overflowing inboxes to listlessly stare into space, something extraordinarily fascinating could catch your attention. It could be a stray dragonfly perched on the window ledge, or perhaps a tree with a huge canopy farther away. […]
How creative pursuits open up new vistas for scientific exploration On a sunny day in the 1600s, in the picturesque town of Lombardy, Italy, an artist was busy at work in a hospital. This might sound strange, but it was a perfectly ordinary occurrence in the life of Leonardo da Vinci. The fifty-something-year-old was […]
Staff who support high-stakes research A long walk downhill on Silver Oak Marg leads you to the quiet edge of campus, where the bustle of the main roads fades into the murmur of trees. The air feels cooler here. Just past the Combustion Gasification and Propulsion Laboratory (CGPL), there is a gate on the left. […]
Hunting strategies of predatory bacteria In 1900, a young medical student named Alexander Fleming was studying at St Mary’s Hospital Medical School in London. Fleming also served in the London Scottish Regiment of the Territorial Army, where he became an expert marksman. His talent for shooting caught the eye of the captain of St […]
Why urban diseases like rabies and dengue are so hard to control Less than a kilometre from Bengaluru’s Lalbagh botanical garden lies the Bisilu Maramma Devi temple. The goddess has another name: Plague Maramma. Devotees believe that the deity harnesses the sun’s power to kill bacteria and viruses and ward off illnesses. The temple […]
Researchers are using science to improve our coffee It’s a crisp, windy morning in Bengaluru. I open my jar of fresh coffee powder and pack some tightly into my coffee filter. I then gently pour some boiling water over the bed of coffee grounds, filling it to the brim. Watching the water burble over […]
Beauty and bias in perceiving art “I feel like we are nearing the end of times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves.” Hayao Miyazaki, the Japanese animator and co-founder of the renowned production house Studio Ghibli, uttered these words in 2016 after seeing an AI-generated animation film for the first time. Nine years […]
The scientist for social development One morning in the early 1940s, 12-year-old Amulya Reddy received a letter from his uncle and hero, CGK Reddy, a marine engineer and political activist. The letter, written on a rough piece of paper, had arrived from the Madras jail where CGK was imprisoned for his anti-British activities. In […]
Secret lives of mixed species groups Some years ago, while driving through the scenic Masai Mara, a savannah wilderness in Kenya, Kartik Shanker made an interesting observation. “Various species of ungulates (hoofed mammals) like gazelles, zebras, and wildebeests were foraging together, but what was interesting was that smaller individuals grouped with similarly sized individuals […]
