IISc to honour 5 distinguished alumni for 2023

Bengaluru: The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) on Tuesday announced the winners of its Distinguished Alumni Awards for the year 2023.

The awardees this year are DN Prahlad, Prof KK Ramakrishnan, Prof Mrinalini Chatta Rao, S Somanath, and Dr Dheepa Srinivasan. The annual awards recognise exceptional contributions made by IISc alumni to their profession, society, and the institute.

Prahlad, founder of Bengaluru-based Surya Software Systems Private Limited, had earlier pioneered the development of indigenous hardware and software products for global markets in pre-liberalisation India. Prior to founding Surya, he played a key role in the growth of Infosys Technologies.

DN Prahlad

Ramakrishnan, currently Distinguished Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of California, has 173 patents in his name and has made immense contributions to solving fundamental problems in building the internet, specifically in network interface design, congestion control, network virtualisation, and operating system support.

KK Ramakrishnan

Mrinalini is Professor Emerita at the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, University of Illinois at Chicago. She has pioneered research on elucidating the molecular basis of cell signalling.

Mrinalini Rao 

Somanath is the Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) and Secretary of the Department of Space. Under his leadership, Isro carried out Chandrayaan-3, making India the first country to successfully land a spacecraft near the lunar south pole.

S Somanath

Dheepa is Chief Engineer at the Pratt & Whitney R&D Centre on the IISc campus. She has over 35 patents in her name and has developed more than 50 technologies and process applications that are now running in several gas turbines and steam turbines. She is also a pioneer in metal 3D printing and has developed several applications for metal laser additive manufacturing.

Dr Dheepa Srinivasan

The nominations for the alumni awards are evaluated by a committee chaired by the director, IISc. The awards will be presented at a ceremony in December. IISc Director Prof G Rangarajan hoped that the stories of these alumni resonate as a source of inspiration for the IISc community.