BENGALURU: Manchanahalli Rangaswamy Satyanarayana Rao, popularly known as MRS Rao, an eminent Indian scientist and Padma Shri awardee, died of cardiac arrest at 7 pm at his residence in Tata Nagar in Bengaluru on Sunday.
He was well known for his discipline, scientific knowledge, patience, soft-spoken nature and mentorship of PhD students.
The former Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research president is survived by his wife Padma S Rao and two sons Sharat and Rohan.
MR Satyanarayana Rao's colleagues told TNIE that his last rites will be conducted on Tuesday after one of his sons returns from Brisbane.
Born on January 21, 1948, in Mysuru, the 75-year-old scientist, was the first scientist to initiate Chromatin Biology research in India.
Prior to his demise, he was working as an Honorary Professor at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research and was actively running the Chromatin Biology laboratory in the institute.
He was honoured with the Padma Sri award in 2010 for his contributions to the field of science and engineering.
He was also honoured by the Karnataka state government with the Sir MV Visvesvaraya Award for his contribution to the field of science and research.
He was the President of the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, from 2003-13.
He was also the chairman of many central government science committees. He was also on all committees of the Indian Council of medical research.
Prof Rao completed his BSc in 1966 and Msc in 1968 from Bengaluru University. He did his PhD in biochemistry from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru in 1973.
He then did his postdoctoral research at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston from 1974–76, where he also worked as an assistant professor.
When he returned to India, he joined the Department of Biochemistry at IISc.
In over 30 years of his research career, Prof Rao has mentored and guided over 35 PhD students and hundreds of trainees.