Gymkhana corner

Brief results of the recently conducted Table Tennis tournament are given below

Men's Singles
Champion- Anupam Ghosh (Phy)
Runner-up - Prabuchandran K.J (CSA)

Women's Singles
Champion- Amrutha A A (MGMT.)
Runner-up - Paromita Kundu (MRC)

Men's Doubles
Winners- Anupam Ghosh(Phy) and Divyanshu Joshi(CPDM)
Runners- Thotreingam Kasar (EE) and Senti Imsong (CHEP)

Mixed Doubles
Winners- Anupam Ghosh (Phy) and Sneha Eashwar
Runners- D.R. Abhiram (AE) and Amrutha A A (MGMT.)

**No participants for Women's doubles 

Solid Waste Management

All of us know the importance of recycling. We are living in a finite planet and we cannot keep on consuming finite resources without running out of it someday. Our institute generates considerable amount of solid waste as a by-product of routine activities. If we don’t segregate different kinds of waste, it cannot be recycled. So all the unsegregated garbage that we generate are taken by a civic agency and dumped in a landfill. These landfills cause serious environmental pollution to the surrounding areas.

According to Municipal Solid Waste management rules charted out by Government of India, the segregation of waste has to be done at the source i.e. by us. As we know these rules are hardly enforced. But IISc shouldn’t need any enforcing to be environmentally friendly. Let us start directing as much waste as possible to a recycle bin rather than regular garbage bins.

BBMP along with ITC has taken a positive step towards recycling of waste. Every week, the ITC-BBMP vehicle comes to our campus for buying these segregated wastes. BBMP reuses the plastic waste by mixing with Bitumen to lay better roads. ITC uses paper bits to make recycled paper. Glass, Metals and e-waste are given for respective recycling units.

This system is already being implemented in faculty quarters, Centre for Ecological Sciences and Department of Biochemistry. The environmental initiatives committee of Students’ council has recently joined the drive to segregate and recycle waste. We have placed a set of bins for plastic and paper waste near the entrance of hostel block-1 (opposite to A-Mess). We are also working to initiate waste segregation in other departments and hostels. The student community is requested to create awareness and support this initiative to lead our society towards a more sustainable future.

S.M. Mohanasundaram (Physics)

Environmental Initiatives committee

IISc in news

India’s best is not the best in the world
The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) has been ranked as the best Indian institution for having the highest number of publications in the world’s top journals but IISc and all the IITs together published just 16 papers in the world’s top journals like the Nature, Science and Cell, while the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Boston, alone published more than 350 papers in these journals.

The study has been published in the current issue of the IISc’s journal Current Science.

IISc, IIM-B to collaborate on technology, innovation
The Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, on Wednesday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B)

The technology and innovation management activities will involve joint identification of intellectual property at IISc, strategies for its marketing, joint incubation and start-up companies between IISc and IIMB.

Prestigious Indian research institute places multiple system order with Oxford …
Oxford Instruments Plasma Technology, leader in etch, deposition and growth systems, has recently received an order for three plasma etch and deposition tools from the Centre of Excellence in Nanoelectronics (CEN) at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bangalore, India.

Comments Prof.Navakanta Bhat from the Department of Electrical Communication Engineering at IISc “Our new facility will be one of its kind in the country with a 14,000 sq.ft clean room in a new building (90,000 sq.ft) for the Centre for Nano Science and Engineering (CeNSE).”

‘Hottest hot spot’ should be conserved, says IISc study
A study made by Energy and Wetland Research Group, Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Sciences (IISc) scientists T V Ramachandra, M D Subash Chandran, Harish Bhat, G R Rao, Sumesh Dudmani, M Boominathan, Vishnu Mukri and S Bharath in the context of proposed mega hydro electric power shows that the short-sighted development project poses a threat to the ecology and biodiversity of the area. Terming the project as ecologically unsound and economically unviable, the study mentioned in detail the species to be affected which includes birds, reptiles, mammals and butterflies, besides the elephant-reserve and elephant-corridor.

Nobel prize ultimate goal for Tathagat Tulsi
Tathagat Avatar Tulsi, the child prodigy who teaches physics at the Institute of Technology (IIT) Mumbai, has said his childhood ambition is to win the coveted Nobel prize. However, Tathagat said his latest ambition is to serve society through his scientific work.

Tathagat became India”s youngest PhD holder at the age of 21, graduating from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bangalore.
He claimed that his PhD thesis Generalisations of the Quantum Search Algorithm was the shortest in India at 33 pages.

IISc student wins Yahoo! KSC award
Ramasuri Narayanam, a PhD student from the Department of Computer Science and Automation, Indian Institute of Science-Bangalore (IISc), was recognised for his research proposal on ‘Game Theoretic models for Social Network Analysis’

23 winners from 16 U.S. universities have been selected. Ramasuri is the only Indian national to win the Yahoo! KSC (Key Scientific Challenges) Award .

“I am thrilled to be selected for the KSC Honorable Mention Award and would like to credit some of the success to the excellent guidance by Professor Y. Narahari and the research environment at the Department of CSA, IISc” said Ramasuri Narayanam

India should consider new-generation biofuels
India imports over three-quarters of its petroleum needs, pegged at 56 million metric tonnes in 2007

In 2009 the country announced a national biofuel policy aimed at substituting 20 per cent of fossil fuel consumption using non-edible oilseeds by 2017.

An IISc team analysed the socio-economic implications of the biofuel programme,

N. H. Ravindranath, professor at the centre for sustainable development at IISc and one of the report’s authors said that more research was needed ‘’on plant breeding, soil conditions and watering requirements” before large-scale cultivation could be undertaken.

Bhatnagar award for 3 B’lore scientists
Three scientists from Bangalore are among the nine chosen for the prestigious Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize 2010 for their achievement in science and technology, with three of the awardees being women for the first time.

Swapan K Pati of the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, G K Ananthasuresh of the Indian Institute of Science and Umesh Vasudeo Waghmare, the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, bagged the award for their work in Chemical Sciences, Engineering Sciences and Physical Sciences, respectively.