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The world is definitely getting hotter, thanks to climate change – the topic that is hottest at the moment! What responsibilities do scientific institutes and businesses have, to make this world a cooler place, quite literally? Who can explain this better than Ms. Gilbert, Head of Policy at the Grantham Institute - Climate Change and Environment at Imperial College London! Ms. Gilbert is engaged in connecting relevant research across universities with policy-makers and businesses. In a candid interview during her visit to the Divecha Centre for Climate Change at the Indian Institute of Science, she opens up on her role and its challenges, the opportunities this situation presents, and her opinions on actions that need to be taken in tackling climate change.

The frog was first chanced upon by a citizen scientist thinking it was a bird call. 

Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the deadliest infectious diseases in the world, affecting 9.6 million people worldwide in 2015, of which 2.2 million were in India. Although tuberculosis is curable through antibiotics, the increasing prevalence of multi-drug resistant forms of TB has become a major concern. A new study from the lab of Prof. Krishnamurthy Natarajan at the University of Delhi, uncovers new mechanisms through which the TB microbe interacts with cells of the host immune system, hijacking their function and preventing them from doing their job properly. The findings of the study point to new ways of treating patients afflicted with drug-resistant TB.

A protective sheath covering the earth, bombarding cosmic rays, violent storms in the upper atmosphere – these are not figments of imagination from a sci-fi novel but are rather accurate descriptions of the space surrounding the earth. In fact, the space around our planet is chock full of high energy particles whizzing around, like the solar wind, a steady stream of charged particles emanating from the sun and Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCR), ultra high energy particles of cosmic origins travelling at nearly the speed of light. Why then don’t we have to bother about the effects of such high energy particles that can affect our electronic gadgets and damage our DNA? The answer is the geomagnetic field, the magnetic field of the earth, extending from the core out into space a distance of several earth radii, forming a region around the earth called the magnetosphere.The GMF acts as our natural shield by deflecting high energy charged particles away from the earth.

A team of frog enthusiasts, including scientists from Gubbi Labs, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE) - Bengaluru and the National University of Singapore (NUS), have uncovered a widespread population of the endangered Sholiga Narrow Mouthed Frog (Microhyla sholigari) along the west coast of India. Rtd, Prof. Sushil Kumar Dutta of the Utkal University, Orissa and P. Ray of the Zoological Survey of India had originally described this tiny frog, measuring up to 1.7 cm, from the Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Tiger Reserve (BRTTR) in the year 2000.

How many tropical diseases do you know of? Malaria, dengue and sleeping sickness immediately come to mind. Maybe leprosy, if you think hard enough. But, many of us may not have heard of cutaneous leishmaniasis, a less dangerous but much more prevalent cousin of kala azar or black fever. Cutaneous Leishmaniasis (CL) is caused by the protozoan Leishmania parasites which are transmitted by the bite of infected female sandflies. A team of researchers led by Dr. Shailza Singh from the National Centre for Cell Science (NCCS), Pune have been studying this disease extensively and have now discovered a new lead compound to help combat this neglected tropical disease. Dr. Sudipta Basu and his team from Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune have co-authored this work.

Indian Institute of Science (IISc.) entered a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Volvo group in India to pursue collaborative research in the field of transportation and automobiles. As per the MoU, Volvo Group Trucks Technology (GTT), the global research, engineering and development arm of Volvo, along with IISc, will embark on research and development in future automotive technologies. The MoU was signed by Mr. V. Rajarajan, Registrar of IISc and Dr. Jan-Ove Östensen, VP Advanced Technology & Research, Volvo Group.

In a major breakthrough in the field of graphene based electronics, researchers from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, have shown a big jump in understanding the quantum nature of graphene’s interface with outside world. The research team lead by Prof. Mayank Shrivastava (Department of Electronic Systems Engineering), studied how the overlap of atomic orbitals between Carbon and metal atoms affects the graphene-metal interface. The study has enabled them to invent novel techniques to engineer graphene contact that has the lowest recorded resistance to the external world. Their discovery and subsequent invention, while breaking several records – including the one from IBM’s research centre in T. J. Watson, USA – has eventually allowed achieving the highest transistor performance. This work, which is co-authored by PhD student Adil Meersha and co-investigators Prof. Srinivasan Raghavan and Prof. Navakanta Bhat is showcased at International Electron Device Meeting (IEDM), the world’s most competitive platform in the field of electron devices, which mostly showcases technology and fundamental breakthroughs in the field.

In a society dominated by people who can independently carry out daily activities, the challenges faced by differently abled individuals are rarely acknowledged. With thoughtful design approaches, simple day-to-day activities could be made easier for such individuals. A great example of this is a novel hygiene product designed by Master students Shubham Pudke and Suyog Dhanawade under the guidance of Prof. Dibakar Sen at the Centre for Product Design and Manufacturing, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore to aid disabled women with just one functional hand. The newly designed sanitary napkin wearing aid not only meets the hygienic demands, but also enables its use without relying on a caregiver. “Activities of daily lives are primary activities for everyone for their dignity and independence from physical support of others. It enables other family members to explore sources of earnings when the primary bread earner becomes disabled due to any circumstances”, says Prof. Sen, elaborating on the motivation for the study.

Indian Institute of Science (IISc.) entered a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Volvo group in India to pursue collaborative research in the field of transportation and automobiles. As per the MoU, Volvo Group Trucks Technology (GTT), the global research, engineering and development arm of Volvo, along with IISc, will embark on research and development in future automotive technologies. The MoU was signed by Dr. K. Paneer Selvam, Joint Registrar of IISc and Dr. Jan-Ove Östensen, VP Advanced Technology & Research, Volvo Group.