Infosys Award Function 2018

Videos of the Scientific lectures

Lecture by Prof. Krishna N. Ganesh

Lecture by Prof. Amol Dighe

Speaker 1:

Prof. Krishna N. Ganesh
Director, IISER, Tirupati

Krishna N. Ganesh (born 1953) obtained his B.Sc (1970) and M.Sc (1972) degrees in Chemistry from Bangalore University and did his Ph.D. (1976) in Chemistry at Delhi University. A Commonwealth Fellowship resulted in another Ph.D. degree in 1980 from the University of Cambridge, UK. He joined the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CSIR) at Hyderabad in 1981 where he established India’s first micro synthesis DNA facility. In 1987, he relocated to the National Chemical Laboratory (NCL- CSIR) where he became the Head of Organic Chemistry Division in 1994. He was appointed as the first Director of the newly founded Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) at Pune in 2006. In 2017 he became the Director of IISER, Tirupati, earning the unique distinction of being the founding director of two IISERs. He has more than 160 publications in reputed international journals, 2 international patents and guided 45 students for their doctoral degrees.

Prof Ganesh is a Fellow of all three Science Academies in India and also a Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS). He served as the President of the Division of Organic and Biomolecular Chemistry of IUPAC (2012-2013). Prof Ganesh has received many professional awards, including Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar award in Chemical Sciences (CSIR), TWAS Prize for Chemical Sciences, and SASTRA-CNR Rao Award. He has served as a member of various policy making and advisory bodies of major research institutions and departments of the government. Prof. Ganesh has been a member of the editorial boards of a number of reputed international research journals.

Speaker 2:

Prof. Amol Dighe
TIFR, Mumbai

Dr. Amol Dighe is a Professor of Physics at Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, in the
Department of Theoretical Physics. He works in the area of High Energy Physics, which aims to understand the nature of fundamental interactions by studying the properties of elementary particles. His recent research has focused on the particles known as neutrinos: their nature and the role they play in astrophysics and cosmology. He looks for signals of new physics at experiments like the Large Hadron Collider, and in the particles that come from the sky.

He completed his B.Tech. in Engineering Physics (1992) from the Indian Institute of
Technology, Bombay. His M.S. and Ph.D. (1997) were from the University of Chicago,
where he explored signals of charge-parity violation in particle physics interactions. Later he was a postdoctoral researcher in ICTP (Trieste, Italy), CERN (Geneva, Switzerland), and Max Planck Institute for Physics (Munich, Germany), before joining TIFR as a faculty member in 2003.

He was one of the first Indian Bronze Medalists in the International Mathematical Olympiad, held in Germany in 1989. He has received the Institute Silver Medal from IIT Bombay, and the Worldlab-CERN John Bell Scholarship. He was the Leader of the Max Planck – India Partner Group in Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics for five years. He has been elected a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences and the Indian National Science Academy. He has won the Swarnajayanti Fellowship from the Department of Science and Technology and is the recipient of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award.

Chief Guest:

Prof. Suhas Pednekar
Vice-Chancellor, University of Mumbai

Prof. Suhas Pednekar has been recently appointed Vice-Chancellor of the University of Mumbai. He has over 30 years of academic experience as an undergraduate, postgraduate teacher, and researcher. His inherent passion, commitment, and dedication towards academics and research led to his appointment as Principal of Ramnarain Ruia College in 2006, a position he held until April 2018.

Prof. Pednekar holds a Doctoral Degree in Organic Chemistry and was a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Stevens Institute of Technology, New Jersey, USA. Prof. Pednekar’s areas of research interest are Green Chemistry, Pharmacological and Chemical Investigation of Medicinal Plants, and Marine Biotechnology. He has presented his research findings in many national and international conferences and has published over 50 research papers in national and international journals of repute. He has undertaken collaborative research projects with many Universities in India and abroad and has successfully guided over 25 students for Doctoral and Masters’ programmes.

Prof. Pednekar has vast administrative experience and has served as a member of official bodies of the Institute of Chemical Technology (Mumbai), University of Mumbai and various state and national level bodies engaged in the enhancement of quality of education, such as the Working Group on Higher Education (XII Five Year Plan) Planning Commission of India, Committee for Revision of Maharashtra Universities’ Act, Government of Maharashtra, Task Force Committee, Government of Maharashtra for New National Education Policy, Education Innovation Committee & Commercial Examination Board, Indian Merchants’ Chamber. He has been the President, Vice-President, Joint Secretary and Member of the Executive Committee, Indian Chemical Society, Mumbai Branch. He is also the Life Member of many scientific bodies.

Prof. Pednekar is the recipient of several awards which include the Best Chemistry Teacher
Award at National level by Tata Chemicals Ltd. given in association with the Association of Chemistry Teachers, Royal Society of Chemistry, Confederation of Indian Industry and Godrej (2013), and the Best Teacher Award, Government of Maharashtra (2012).