‘We will encourage incubation of deep science and tech start-ups’

The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) has topped the national list in the just-released 2023 QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) World University rankings while climbing to a global rank of 155. Retaining the global top rank in its strongest performing metric, Citations per Faculty, the Institute showed improvements in employer reputation, teaching capacity and more.

But IISc is still a long way from breaking into the top 50, an objective outlined when it was chosen as an Institute of Eminence with additional funding and autonomy. In an interview with DH’s Rasheed Kappan, the institute director Prof Govindan Rangarajan talks about launching an interdisciplinary B Tech in Mathematics and Computing, the first post-school bachelor’s engineering programme in IISc’s history; research leading to tangible State policy, diversification into the medical arena and more.

IISc has been an ‘Institute of Eminence’ identified for additional funds and greater autonomy to develop its core strengths and break into the top 50 in the world ranking. But this is still a long way.

The support from the Ministry of Education through the Institute of Eminence programme has been extremely valuable in helping us achieve some of our ambitious goals. It has enabled us to expand our educational offerings to include many new interdisciplinary PhD and Master’s degree programmes, improve lab infrastructure and student amenities, and kick-start cutting-edge research in several critical and futuristic areas.

In the coming years, we will focus on building our core research strengths in all frontiers of science, engineering and medicine, develop world-class teaching programmes, nurture translational research and encourage the incubation of deep science and technology start-ups.

We will also continue to carry out activities with direct social impact, such as training school teachers, disseminating sustainable rural technologies, and research in areas like climate change, healthcare, water management, and renewable energy. At the same time, we will focus on embracing modern professional practices, and benchmarking ourselves against international standards.

We are also consistently making efforts to attract and retain highly-qualified researchers, by providing generous start-up grants to young faculty members, establishing endowed Chair and Young Investigator positions to incentivise high-performing researchers, implementing rigorous tenure-track evaluations, improving administrative support for faculty members and students, increasing outreach, and emphasising inclusivity in hiring.

The Institute has maintained its top global rank on citations per faculty, a QS ranking parameter assessing research strength and impact. How was this achieved despite low funding compared to the top Ivy League institutes globally?

Since its inception, research has been central to the mandate of the Institute. IISc has always encouraged its faculty members to initiate and carry out cutting-edge research on par with their national and international counterparts.

The Institute continuously strives to provide the required support and infrastructure that they need to excel, and offers complete freedom to the faculty members to pursue their research interests. IISc is especially renowned for its emphasis on interdisciplinary research, bringing researchers from across disciplines to work together and solve large-scale problems, an example being the newly launched quantum technologies initiative.

Generally, Indian institutions don’t do well in translating good research to tangible actions, and they remain in thesis papers. What can be done to change this?

At the Institute, faculty members are not only encouraged to pursue basic research but also applied and translational research with social impact. We have several mechanisms and administrative structures in place to help faculty members establish startups, collaborate with industry partners on technology development, and commercialise their inventions for societal benefit.

How much of IISc’s deep research into mobility, ecology and other areas is impacting policy decisions at the State and Central government levels?

The Institute has many departments and centres working directly with government agencies to provide key insights for policy decisions. For example, scientists at the Divecha Centre for Climate Change have been engaging with policymakers and contributing to shaping climate change-related policies at the national level.

Similarly, the Centre for Infrastructure, Sustainable Transportation and Urban Planning has been working with civic authorities on the planning, operation, design, management, and policy of transportation systems in India. Several other departments and centres are also involved in work that impacts policy decisions at the regional and national levels.

IISc has proposed to set up a postgraduate medical school and an 832-bed not-for-profit hospital. Why is the institute diversifying its core focus areas?

IISc has a century-old legacy of excellence in science and engineering. Given the ongoing pandemic, we have realised that we should also have a strong focus on clinical research for social good, particularly for the ‘next 6 billion’ people in India and other developing regions. Cutting-edge clinical research requires the confluence of science, engineering, and medicine.

The addition of a medical school will leverage our existing core strengths and would lead to deep science and technology-based discoveries, inventions, and innovations leading to affordable healthcare for all. With this goal in mind, we plan to establish a one-of-a-kind postgraduate medical school and an 832-bed not-for-profit hospital, named the Bagchi-Parthasarathy Hospital, on our Bengaluru campus.

Basic Science degree students nationwide languish with low employment potential. How can IISc take the lead in democratising opportunities in core sciences, boosting market readiness of science graduates?

A large number of young men and women enter the higher education system in India through undergraduate colleges and universities. The quality of education that they receive at the undergraduate level makes a major impact on their career aspirations. It is in this context that the Institute launched a unique four-year Bachelor of Science (Research) programme a few years ago. The novelty of this programme lies in its interdisciplinary and research-focused approach, strong flavour of engineering, and exposure to disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.

This August, we will also be starting an interdisciplinary B Tech programme in Mathematics and Computing. This will be the first post-school bachelor’s engineering programme in IISc’s history.

The past few decades have seen a phenomenal growth in mathematics associated with the generation, storage, distribution and utilisation of information, making mathematics the core of emerging disciplines like Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Robotics, Data Science, and Quantum Computing.

The vision of the BTech programme is to produce leaders who will be at the forefront of research, development and innovation in these disciplines and futuristic technologies that require a deep use of mathematics, computer science and data science.