Infosys Science Foundation annually awards Infosys Prize for Indians and NRIs for outstanding research in engineering and computer science, humanities, life sciences, mathematics, physical sciences, and social sciences. Set up in 2009, the winners are awarded `50 lakh each, a gold medallion and a citation certificate. This year’s winners were honoured on January 3 at a glittering ceremony held in New Delhi. Humanities was introduced this year. A select panel of judges comprising eminent scientists and professors from around the world pick the winners. The jury chairs of this year were Amartya Sen, Kaushik Basu, Shrinivas Kulkarni, Pradeep K Khosla, Srinivasa SR Varadhan and Inder Verma. A look at the lives and achievements of these seven winners
A Ajaya Ghosh
Profile: Prof Ajayaghosh, a senior scientist at National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology (NIIST), CSIR, Thiruvananthapuram, was awarded the Infosys honour for physical sciences. He obtained his master’s in science from Kerala University in 1984 and a PhD from Calicut University in 1988. He joined the Regional Research Laboratory, CSIR (presently NIIST), as a scientist in 1988. He has received several awards such as the Thomson Reuters Research Excellence Award (2009), Outstanding Researcher Award of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) (2009), Ramanna Fellowship of the Department of Science and Technology, India (DST) (2007), and the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for chemical sciences (2007). He is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Sciences, India, and is on the international advisory board of the journal, Chemistry-An Asian Journal. He is a CSIR-Outstanding Scientist at CSIR-NIIST, Thiruvananthapuram and the Dean of Chemical Sciences, Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR), New Delhi.
Work: Prof Ajayaghosh has studied supramolecular chemistry, with emphasis on design and synthesis of molecular assemblies called organogels, a new class of materials with great potential for photonic and electronic applications. To control both the size and shape of these soft nanomaterials, he designed hydrogen bond functionalities into fluorophores called phenylenevinylenes, to optimise weak noncovalent attractive interactions between the aromatic cores of the monomer units. Prof Ajayaghosh was the first investigator to make functional phenylenevinylene organogels from designed building blocks. He has shown that these self-assembled nanomaterials can be used to control electronic energy transfer processes, paving the way for the development of superior light harvesting devices.
Interests: In between engaging in research and associate works, and the travel that comes with his academic pursuits, Prof Ajayaghosh relaxes through music and gardening.
Winnerspeak: Basically I am a chemist who is interested in the interdisciplinary area of chemistry with focus on advance materials. My research is about understanding how molecules can communicate to each other and how subsequently these interactions lead them (the molecules) to organise themselves to form molecular architecture. Studying this is important for designing advance materials. Research proves that there are special kinds of molecules with electronic properties that can conduct electricity, charge between molecules, emit light when excited, etc. Applications of these molecules include sensing of certain other molecules, imaging certain kinds of systems like biological cells, security applications, etc. The ultimate aim of any designer is to make sure their work is useful to the society they are in. In this regard, I want to make sure these molecules find practical applications, which have a direct bearing on common man.
Amit Chaudhari
Profile: Amit is a professor of contemporary literature, University of East Anglia, UK, and completed his bachelor’s in arts from University College London, UK, in 1986 and holds a PhD from Balliol College, Oxford, in 1993. His past appointments include Samuel Fischer Guest Professor of Literature at the Freie University in Berlin (2005-2006); visiting professor at the Writing Division, School of the Arts, Columbia University (2002); Leverhulme Special Research Fellow at Faculty of English, Cambridge University (1997-99); and Creative Arts Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford (1992-95). He was made Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009.
He has received several awards such as DSC Prize for South Asian Literature (2011), Commonwealth Writers Prize (South East and Europe Region, Best Book) (2010), Sahitya Akademi award (2002), and the Betty Trask prize (1991). He has written five novels — The Immortals, Afternoon Raag, A New World, Freedom Song, A Strange and Sublime Address.
Work: His literary research ranges from an early book on DH Lawrence to a recent book on Rabindranath Tagore, and a large number of critical essays on Indian and English Literature. His recently published On Tagore: Reading the Poet Today, steers past a number of cliches about Tagore and relates his thought and his poetry to notions of “tradition” and “modernity,” explores his ideas of history and of nature, while also situating him in the context of global literature. His collection of essays, Clearing A Space: Reflections on India, Literature, and Culture, contains engaging and penetrating reviews and discussions of a vast span of writers including Salman Rushdie, VS Naipaul and Arun Kolatkar.
Interests: Amit will be out with his new book Calcutta: Two Years in the City in February. He has also been putting together a lot of essays and also working on his interests as a musician. Gratified by the Infosys honour, Amit rues the lack of recognition for critical thinking in India. A lover of Hindustan classical music, Amit’s favourite books include Questions of Travel by Elizabeth Bishop, The Enigma of Arrival by VS Naipaul, Postmodernism or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism by Fredric Jameson and Mythology by Roland Barthes.
Winnerspeak: During the first half of the 20th century, a lot of influential critics were themselves creative artists. Now its become more compartmentalised and specialised.
There was very little overlap between a creative writer and critical work. And this is gradually happening again. Critical work is slightly impoverished. It has lost something by becoming disconnected and directly bearing upon critical work. Critical writing now is not about writing criticism, but is merely a subject of criticism. I believe my award can cement that thinking is not only about academic specialisations, but can transcend it. It is not just about being identified with a particular career/profession, it can go beyond these, and in my case, it has transgressed and spilled over my career path.
This has become a preoccupation for my vocation as a writer. This award means there is space for recognition that thinking is not a career, it is a response to what we do. As a writer of imaginative fiction, I have taken issues with the whole notion of the perpetual realism versus fantasy debate, and have tried to make Indian writing more than epic and fantasy.
Sanjay Subrahmanyam
Prof Sanjay Subrahmanyam was awarded the Infosys Prize for Humanities for his research in South Asian history (1500-1800). He earned his master’s in economics from University of Delhi in 1982 and a PhD from Delhi School of Economics in 1987. He is the professor and Doshi Chair of Indian History at University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA) from 2004. He was the founding Director of UCLA’s Center for India and South Asia (July 2005 to June 2011).
Work: Prof Subrahmanyam has published and co-published 25 books and nearly 200 articles. An important contribution of his was to demonstrate the need to transcend the walls that have immured the histories of Asian nations in the past century. Nowhere is this argument more insistently presented than in his two-volume, Explorations in Connected History. This publication demonstrates through an array of striking examples, how thinking beyond areas uncovers the actual linkages that have joined the countries of Eurasia.
In Penumbral Visions, he explores the world of power of early modern South Asia, showing how political structures and cultures were transformed. He has also used the individual life as a window to major movements of history. His Career and Legend of Vasco da Gama deploys archival research to separate myth from legend and offer a new, global view of European expansion. His recent publication, Three Ways of Being Alien, demonstrates how foreigners can understand alien cultures, intelligently and often successfully.
Arunava Sen
Profile: Arunava, professor, planning unit at Indian Statistical Institute, New Delhi, received the Infosys award for social sciences. He received his PhD and MPhil from Oxford University in 1982 and Princeton University in 1987 respectively. He has published several papers in international journals including Econometrica, Journal of Economic Theory, Social Choice and Welfare, Games and Economic Behavior, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Mathematical Economics, and the Journal of Mathematical Psychology. He is a Fellow of Econometric Society (2003). He has several awards to his credit such as the Mahalanobis Memorial Medal of the Indian Econometric Society (2000) and the Koc University Prize (1995) for the best paper in economic design.
Work: Prof Sen’s research is centered around mechanism design, social choice, auction design and game theory. Sen has discussed the potential application of mechanism design theory to the issue of land acquisition for special economic zones or for other industrial developments. He outlines how the requirement of voluntary participation, efficiency and incentive compatibility may be difficult or impossible to achieve simultaneously; and raises the possibilities for second-best alternatives and the role of government in setting the rules to implement these possibilities.
Interests: Arunava lives with his wife, a professor of social studies at the Department of Art History, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and his nine-year-old son. Interested in sports, chess is his personal favourite. Scandinavian crime fiction fascinates him. Better research work for not just himself, but for his students too is his future calling. “I am more than happy with the credit my students receive for their work,” says the 53-year-old.
Winnerspeak: My work explains how private information can be used in design theory and in every day life. Though it is all mathematics and can be technical, it is motivated by civilian work. Though the prize is handsome, I am unfazed by it, but of course, I acknowledge the fact that such awards can spur me, my peers and students to come out with meaningful research.
Satyajit Mayor
Profile: Satyajit, professor of cellular organisation and signalling group, National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bangalore, bags the Infosys prize for his research in life sciences. He obtained his master’s in chemistry from IIT-B, Mumbai and his PhD in life sciences from Rockefeller University, New York.
Work: Satyajit’s work provides new insights into regulated cell surface organisation and membrane dynamics, necessary for understanding self-organisation and trafficking of membrane molecules in living cells, and in signaling between cells.
He has proposed a mechanism that could both generate specialised domains and at once provide local control on membrane protein and lipid composition. He envisages short filaments of action coupling to molecules at the cytoplasmic aspect of the cell surface.
Interests: The 49-year-old divides his time between poetry, fiction, literature, readings on science and society and work. “I have a catholic taste when it comes to fiction and as such don’t have particular favourites,” he states. Into sports during his hey days, Prof Mayor has now turned his attention to squash and swimming. Having an artist for a wife ensures he visits art exhibitions now and then.
Winnerspeak: My work is very fundamental and basic in nature. In layman terms, it can be defined as how when cells put together, they have many modules such as protiens, DNA and other molecules. These molecules exhibit special kinds of arrangement in the cells. These arrangements are extremely peculiar in their distribution and dynamics. What I have tried to do is decipher how these organisation of molecules come about and connect it to how a cell consumes its energy. This award has motivated me to question specific attributes regarding the context of living cells further.
Ashish Lele
Profile: Lele was awarded the Infosys Prize for engineering and computer science. A scientist working with National Chemical Laboratories (NCL), Pune, he received his bachelor’s in chemical engineering from Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai, in 1988 and completed a PhD in chemical engineering from University of Delaware, USA, in 1993.
Prof Lele was awarded CSIR Young Scientist award in 1996, Indian National Science Academy Young Scientist award in 1998, and Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar award in engineering science in 2006. He is a Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering and of the Indian Academy of Science.
He is also the president of the Indian Society of Rheology and a member of the editorial board of the prestigious journal, Rheologica Acta.
Work: Prof Lele probed polymeric material microstructures at the molecular and mesoscopic length scales, and related it to their macroscopic dynamical and equilibrium properties.
His work on smart hydrogels — water swollen cross-linked networks of polymers that respond to stimuli such as temperature, electrical field, etc, and undergo volume phase transitions — demonstrated for the first time, macroscopic self-organisation of these polymers.
The work revealed the process of how the hydrogel cylinder spontaneously self-organised into a coconut-like structure, which could also be reversed. He also showed that the metal ion complexion with specific functional groups attached to polymer chains could lead to the design of gels that mimic the behaviour of spontaneous healing of wounds in animals.
Interests: “A young at heart man at 45”, Lele, lives with his wife who works in an NGO and eight-year-old daughter. Lele in his free time is hooked on to Hindi oldies. Picks up fiction now and then to read to his daughter, and the Harry Potter series is a favourite, for the two of them.
Winnerspeak: I have always been interested in smart hydrogels and in fact, this was my first project when I joined NCL. My interest in them was from a fundamental point of view, what made these materials respond to temperature. Their tendency to dispel water amazed me. Looking forward, I analysed the other aspects of these hydrogels, which make them closer to materials that are biomagnetic — in certain ways, they mimic biological features. I discovered some hydrogels that can spontaneously change their shape, like for example, from cylindrical to spherical. One implication of my work was that one can look at industrial processes for producing plastics. As a second chemical engineer to have won this award from Infosys, this comes as a reward for all those working in chemical engineering domain. This recognition speaks volumes for the research conducted in the country. I am working on converting hydrogen in the air into electricity, that too with a reasonable amount of efficiency and this award is a morale booster for my future efforts. In India, this technology doesn’t exist and I hope to do something about it.
Manjul Bhargava
Profile: Prof Manjul Bhargava, professor of mathematics, Princeton University, USA, was awarded the Infosys prize for his research in mathematical sciences. He earned his AB in mathematics from Harvard University in 1996 and holds a PhD from Princeton University in 2001. He joined Princeton University as a professor of mathematics in 2003. He was the first five-year research fellow of Clay Mathematics Institute during 2000-05. His primary research interests lie in number theory, representation theory, and algebraic geometry.
He has received numerous awards, including three Derek Bok Awards for Excellence in Teaching (1993-95), Hoopes Prize for Excellence in Scholarly Work and Research from Harvard University (1996), AMS-MAA-SIAM Morgan Prize for Outstanding Undergraduate Research in Mathematics (1997), MAA Merten M Hasse Prize for Exposition (2003), a Packard Foundation Fellowship in Science and Engineering (2004), Blumenthal Award (2005), SASTRA Ramanujan Prize (2005), which he shared with Prof Kannan Soundararajan; AMS Cole Prize for number theory (2008) and Prix Fermat (2011). He was also the 2011 Simons Lecturer at MIT. An accomplished tabla player, he studied with Pandit Prem Prakash Sharma and Ustad Zakir Hussain.
Work: Prof Bhargava has developed novel techniques to count objects that were previously considered completely inaccessible. His research focused on the counting of number fields of fixed degree by discriminant. Using elementary but ingenious generalisations of Gauss’ composition law for binary quadratic forms, which had been missed for 200 years, he was able to count the number of quartic and quintic number fields with discriminant less than x, as x tends to infinity. He showed that about 83 per cent of quartic fields had Galois group the full symmetric group, but that 100 per cent of quintic fields had for its Galois group the full symmetric group.
His research provides information about the average number of rational points on elliptic curves. Prof Bhargava and his student Arul Shankar showed that for a positive proportion of elliptic curves the rank is zero. They also showed that the average rank was at most 7/6. In addition, he and Dick Gross showed that a positive proportion of hyper-elliptic curves of genus greater than one with a rational Weierstrass point have at most three rational points.
Interests: The Canadian-born was brought up in the US but has roots in Jaipur. “We speak Hindi at home and celebrate all Indian festivals. I am pretty much an Indian at heart,” laughs Bhargava. Besides mathematics, which is his first love, he likes to tune to Hindustani music and plays a bit of tabla as well.
Winnerspeak: Mathematics had always fascinated me. One of my early childhood memory was stacking oranges in the form of a pyramid. My work primary revolves around understanding whole numbers like prime and square numbers. There is a great mathematical talent in our country. But unfortunately, a lot of them are pushed towards medicine or engineering. This is a mistake that could prove costly not only for the individual but also for the country. With this regard, it is essential to revamp mathematics education in India. Mathematics is not about applying formulae like a robot. Students should be given an opportunity to present their creative talent in this field also.
This award is a huge encouragement for me and my students. With my prize money, I would like to initiate an award, which I hope will push many students towards pure mathematics/basic sciences. My future plans include working on understanding complex mathematical equations. I would also like to establish the connection between number theory and physics, since the former is highly influenced by the latter.