Education – Page 3 – Karnataka First

NATIONAL: KARNATAKA: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGLY / VACCINES : IISc Develops Heat-Tolerant Covid-19 Vaccine

A team of scientists has completed pre-clinical trials and is now gearing up for human testing .

India could soon have a new vaccine for the mutating COVID-19 virus to keep the virus at bay. Scientists at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) have been working on developing a heat-tolerant vaccine that can offer protection against different strains of SARS-CoV-2 which includes both current and future variants. The team has completed pre-clinical trials and is gearing up for the human testing of the vaccine candidate.

According to scientists the evolving nature of the virus and different mutations, they are not sure if the current vaccines can be helpful. Raghavan Varadarajan, Professor at the Molecular Biophysics Unit (MBU) has been leading this research project in collaboration with Mynvax, a startup since the beginning of the pandemic.

After analysing various proteins found in the virus, researchers selected two parts of SARS-CoV-2’s spike protein – the S2 subunit and the Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) – for the new vaccine. The S2 subunit is highly conserved – it mutates much less than the S1 subunit, which is the target of most current vaccines. Scientists have also known that the RBD can provoke a strong immune response in the host. The team created a hybrid protein called RS2 by combining these two components, read a statement released by IISc.

The researchers used mammalian cell lines to study the expression of the hybrid protein. “The protein showed very high levels of expression, and initially I thought that the experiment was not working properly,” said Nidhi Mittal, PhD student at MBU and first author of the study. Further research by Mittal showed that this protein potentially be produced in large quantities.

The team then tested the effects of the protein in both mice and hamster models. They found that the hybrid protein triggered a strong immune response and provided better protection when compared to vaccines containing the whole spike protein.

Varadarajan told TNIE that RS2 has better coverage compared to other vaccines. This could be India’s first homegrown vaccine for the JB.1 variant and others as Covaxin developed for the mutation has become inactive. “Post clinical trials the vaccine can be administered to everyone, starting with healthy human bodies. So far in our animal testing we have not seen any side effects but will have to wait for results on humans,” added Varadarajan.

The RS2 antigen can also be stored at room temperature for a month without the need for cold storage, unlike many vaccines in the market which require mandatory cold storage. This would make the distribution and storage of these vaccine candidates much more economical.

Varadarajan said the vaccine candidate can be tailored to incorporate the RBD region of any new variant of SARS-CoV-2 that might emerge. Its high levels of expression and stability at room temperature can greatly reduce production and distribution costs, making it well-suited for combating COVID-19. “If need be, the vaccine can also be updated as and when the mutation develops over the years,” he added.

source/content: newindianexpess.com (headline edited0

KARNATAKA: LANGUAGE / CULTURE / TECHNOLOGY: A search engine for Tumakuru Dialect: IIIT-B team develops AI interface for Colloquial Kannada

Called Graama-Kannada Audio Search, the interface allows the user to search for and access hyperlocal information from the Tumakuru region in audio format.

Access to information is relatively easy for the city dweller for whom knowledge is at the tip of the finger. Not so much is the case beyond the urban boundaries.

Rural communities frequently depend on community radio, neighbourhood newspapers, and volunteer organisations for hyper-local information. But the corpus of knowledge produced by these entities often remains localised and is absent on the internet making it difficult for the people to re-access it. Added to this are the language challenges.

Students of International Institute of Information Technology-Bangalore (IIIT-B) have devised a solution for this by developing a search interface for colloquial audio content in Kannada language.

Called Graama-Kannada Audio Search, the interface allows the user to search for and access hyperlocal information from the Tumakuru region in audio format.

A search interface for rural communities

The framework was developed by Sharath Srivatsa (PhD Scholar, IIIT-B), Aparna M. (M.S. by Research Scholar, IIIT-B) and Sai Madhavan G. (iMTECH student, IIIT-B) under the guidance of Srinath Srinivasa (Professor and Dean (R&D), Web Science Lab, IIIT-B) and with the help of T. B. Dinesh (iruWay Rural Research Lab, Janastu).

Namma Halli Radio is a community owned WiFimesh radio run by Janastu NGO in the Tumakuru region. Over the years the radio grew an audio corpus rich with information on local customs, cultures, festivals, Covid-19 awareness and so on. But the absence of this data on the internet meant that people could not access the information at a later stage.

The IIIT-B team worked with the community radio and fed the latter’s audio corpus into their search model. The audio was transcribed into text using automatic speech recognition (ASR) models. When a user searches for a certain keyword, this transcribed text would be matched with it to deliver results.

The user can search using keywords in Kannada or English text to obtain results in audio format. The audios would be timestamped to denote the exact location of the keyword.

“For example, someone wants to search for a specific term, say Red Cross. They can just type in the word in English or Kannada. And they’ll be provided with all the audio from the Namma Halli corpus where the word occurs. They can even just jump to the time where the word occurs,” explains Aparna M., one of the team members who developed the interface.

The missing colloquial

Artificial Intelligence (AI) models rely on data fed to them to give outputs. The bias of the data reflects in these models too, as a result of which AI models often fail to reflect the heterogeneity of the human population.

Models like Graama Kannada become relevant here.

Graama Kannada search interface could help add colloquial dialects to language models which have been trained either in English or sanitised formal versions of Kannada.

“The problem with LLM (large language models) is that they are mostly built for a very formal type of Kannada like what is spoken on the All India Radio or seen in a newspaper. They don’t work very well when a person uses colloquial style language to search something,” Ms Aparna explains.

“The main focus of our work is to build models that will be suitable for colloquial content. Since we have access to the community radio’s audio corpus, the model that we have built has given us better accuracy for the Tumakuru dialect,” she notes.

The application, however, currently works on text-based search. But the team notes that they plan to include audio-based search very soon.

“In the future, if someone wants to do a voice search, even if they speak in the Tumakuru dialect, our model will be better in processing it compared to other existing models. The same process can be repeated for other dialects too,” says Ms Aparna.

A window to regional cultures

While the interface has been developed predominantly keeping the community members in mind, Ms Aparna notes that it would also work as a window for the general public to get more local information about an area.

The web application provides a list of most searched words such as Tumakuru, Turuvekere, Gruha Bandhana (quarantine), Dinasi (ration), Lasike (vaccine), Muneshwara Swamy (temple in Tumakuru) and so on.

“This way even if a person is not very familiar with the community, they can understand what the corpus is about by looking at the words that we have given. These keywords can be like a clue to the community to them,” explains Ms. Aparna.

No mean task

The project was started in the beginning of 2022 as part of the PhD work of Sharath Srivatsa, who is the team lead, in collaboration with Janastu. The biggest challenge before the team was converting the audio accessed from the community-radio to text.

“Our idea was to convert the audio to text and then do all the processing on the text. But getting a model to do that was very hard. For low-resource languages (languages with less data available on the internet for training AI systems) like Kannada with dialectical variations, most automatic speech recognition (ASR) models don’t work,” explains Mr. Srivatsa.

Towards the end of 2022, OpenAI introduced the Whisper model for ASR and speech translation. In 2023 Meta also introduced its own multilingual model. The team started experimenting with them and found better results.

But there were still challenges, a major one being spelling mistakes.

“When the audio was converted to text, it had spelling mistakes. For English the word error rate is just around 10% in ASR models given that it is the standard language and spoken across the world. But when it comes to low resource languages, models are not so optimal and efficient. We got around 60% word error rate and out of that 80% was spelling mistake. That is, when the audio was converted to text, it had spelling mistakes.”

The team realised this could become a problem. If the user typed the correct spelling, but the transcript carried a wrong spelling for the same word, the model would fail to match them and deliver results.

So, to address this the team allowed a relaxed criterion or fuzzy matching using which the input text would be compared to texts that are exact or very near.

Simple UI
Once a working model was in place, they started working on the website.

“We made a very simple web application with minimal features. But we made sure that the UI was accessible enough by having Kannada and English words,” says Sai Madhav who worked on the project as part of his internship.

“You can search in English or Kannada. If you do it in English, there is this button for transliterating it from English to Kannada. Let’s say you search the name of a temple. Even with an approximate spelling, it will show you all the audio clips in the corpus that contain that word and the timestamp. So, you can seek to that particular timestamp, and you will be able to hear in what context it is being spoken about,” he adds.

Analysing contrasting worldviews

Apart from adding voice search, the team also plans to add a question-and-answer feature to the model which would allow it to give full-fledged text answer like other LLMs such as ChatGPT.

The team is also trying to analyse the contrast in worldviews between urban and rural communities.

“Information regarding modern societies and what they believe in is well documented and available as well-structured content on the internet. But that’s not the case with low-resource communities. So, we will collect some more corpus on it and try to find out more about their world views and unique beliefs. We want to mine such things and show in in our UI,” says Mr. Srivatsa.

Ms. Aparna explains it further, “We have compared our corpus from the rural region with news corpus in more formal Kannada to find that there is significant difference in the worldviews. For example, let’s take the word development. Rrural community people talk about words like panchayat or Gowda of the village and so on in the context of it. Whereas the mainstream corpus got us results like development, Bangalore and so on.”

The team hopes that in a world were AI models push dominant mainstream views, their efforts would help to add more diversity to the mix.

source/contents: thehindu.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL: NATIONAL / KARNATAKA: EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP: Mangalurean Prof Dr Anjana Devi appointed Director at IFW Dresden, Germany

Prof Dr Anjana Devi has become the new director of the IFW Institute for Material Chemistry on January 1.

Prof Dr Anjana Devi has taken over as the new director of the Institute for Materials Chemistry (IMC) at the Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research (IFW) Dresden. At the same time, she is appointed as the chair of materials chemistry in the faculty of chemistry and food chemistry at the Technical University of Dresden. With her internationally recognized expertise, Devi brings a new thematic focus to the research programme of IFW Dresden.

The IFW Institute for Complex Materials (IKM), as it was previously called, will in future focus on materials chemistry. This will enable the entire institute to work together on an extended interdisciplinary basis, from theoretical calculations to experimental research into new materials for effective and sustainable future technologies.

Anjana Devi has a broad expertise in the field precursor chemistry and the development of new ALD/MOCVD processes of functional materials. She employs novel precursors to synthesize nanostructured advanced functional materials for various applications ranging from micro/nano/opto electronics to energy conversion and storage. The research activities include an interdisciplinary approach with a special focus on bridging synthetic chemistry and materials chemistry. At IFW, the research will be centred on 2D materials, in particular their scalable synthesis, heterostructures and nanostructured surfaces.

The ability to design their electronic and structural properties will significantly expand the application areas of 2D materials for industry and thus lead to sustainable research and development at IFW Dresden. Prof Devi is an active and internationally recognized collaborator undertaking joint projects with leading research groups and industries in the field of ALD and CVD.

“With Anjana Devi, we have gained an outstanding expert in the research field of materials chemistry who has a strong international network and reputation,” emphasizes scientific director Prof Dr Bernd Büchner. “Her expertise in advanced functional materials and their development adds another fundamental pillar to our research program in the research for new materials for future technologies. On behalf of the entire institute, I would like to warmly welcome her.”

With her profound expertise in this field, Prof Devi will establish a competence center for atomic layer deposition with the ASPIRE2D project at IFW Dresden in the coming years, which will aim to process advanced 2D functional materials on an atomic scale for future technologies. The focus is on the development of new molecular precursors and transforming them into nanostructured functional materials followed by testing the materials for device applications. In addition, a systematic understanding and evaluation of selected chemical processes will be undertaken. The new ALD competence center will serve as an interdisciplinary platform for researchers and manufacturing institutions within the Silicon Saxony network and the Leibniz Association. A task which the new director is very pleased to fulfill: “I am very excited to venture deep into the development of advanced nanostructured functional materials at IFW. Technological advances are rising tremendously in various sectors and there is a huge demand for new materials with defined functionalities to be identified and processed. The excellent infrastructure and resources that will be at my disposable and the strong interdisciplinary research activities at IFW will enable me to design and develop purpose-driven advanced materials. 2D materials are exciting owing to their multifaceted properties and thus revolutionizing many fields of applications. As research in this field intensifies, the contribution to this field in terms of scalable synthesis of 2D materials via MOCVD and ALD using novel precursor chemistries can facilitate new technological applications in the future.”

In addition to her professional expertise, Anjana Devi has proven herself to be an internationally connected person who is committed to the urgent challenges of these times. Starting her career as a junior professor at the Ruhr University Bochum in 2002, she was the speaker of the ‘Global Young Faculty’ organization, which dealt with the effects of climate change, and she has been supporting the ‘Soroptimist Club’ project in Bochum since 2017, which gives women and girls the opportunity to access education.

The administrative director of IFW Dresden, Juliane Schmidt, also warmly welcomes Prof Devi to the institute: “With Anjana Devi, another female scientist is taking over the directorship of one of the IFW institutes exactly one year after Yana Vaynzof, which is extremely gratifying. Both directors and their projects were recently selected for the ‘Leibniz Programme for Women Professors’, which supports innovative research by women in science. We are pleased to be role models for the next generations of researchers in this context.

Prof Dr Anjana Devi studied chemistry, physics, mathematics and materials science at St Agnes College under Mangalore University until 1991. She completed her PhD in materials science at the Materials Research Center of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru. With a fellowship awarded by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, she moved to Ruhr University Bochum (RUB) as a postdoc in 1998. She has been a junior professor at RUB since 2002 and professor of inorganic materials chemistry since 2011.

In 2020, she was awarded an honorary doctorate in science and technology by Aalto University in Finland in recognition of her contributions to the field of precursor chemistry for CVD and ALD applications. In 2021, Prof Devi received the Attract grant from the Fraunhofer Society for carrying out research on 2D materials for innovative sensors using ALD technology. Since then, she has been leading the Nanostructured Sensor Materials (NSM) research group at the Fraunhofer Institute for Microelectronic Circuits and Systems (IMS) in Duisburg.

Starting January this year, she is the director of the Institute for Materials Chemistry (IMC) at IFW Dresden and professor of materials chemistry at TU Dresden.

source/content: daijiworld.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL: NATIONAL: KARNATAKA: ARTIC RESEARCH: Raman Research Institute Scientists head to Arctic to study ‘Cosmic Dawn’

The 4-member team will be working in the vicinity of the Himadri research station in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.

A team of scientists from Bengaluru’s Raman Research Institute has been sent to the Arctic Circle for a research expedition. The four-member team, which is led by Girish B S of RRI’S Electronics Engineering Group, will be working in the vicinity of the Himadri research station, located in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.

The mission, which was flagged off from Delhi on Monday, is set to last until January 15, under the aegis of the Ministry of Earth Sciences. The mission will seek to deploy instruments near Himadri to study radio signals in the 5 to 500 megahertz range. It will assess whether Svalbard is “radio-quiet” enough to deploy Shaped Antenna measurement of the background Radio Spectrum (SARAS) radio telescopes.

The radio telescopes are used in the study of the ‘cosmic dawn’, an era in the development of the universe which saw the formation of the first stars and galaxies.

According to a statement from the RRI, these ancient signals are easily drowned out by modern cell phone towers and other interference.

Girish B S stated that due to rampant urbanisation in recent years, the space for the deployment of scientific experiments for cosmological studies is fast shrinking. “Several places, where low frequency astronomical observations were conducted in the past, are no longer suitable for carrying out precision measurements. And the biggest limitation in achieving the required sensitivity is RFI (radio frequency interference),” he said.

SARAS has previously been deployed in remote parts of Karnataka and Ladakh.

source/content: indianexpress.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL: INDIA / KARNATAKA: GUINNESS RECORD: Kundapur’s Students of Hattiangadi Siddivinayaka School Register Guinness Record in Mosaic Painting

Students of Hattiangadi Siddivinayaka School on the threshold of celebrating their silver jubilee have achieved Guinness record by creating the mosaic picture of H Ramachandra Bhat, founder of the residential school and spiritual leader.

As many as 1,228 people participated to complete the task at 3 pm on December 3 and got a new record registered in the Guinness Book of World Records.

The principal, administrative official, teachers, staff and well-wishers joined in the school premises on December 1 to create the 7.75 feet long and 5.625 feet wide picture with an area of 42.78 square feet using 1,228 rotating rubix cubes. The Rotating Rubik’s Cube creation in the participation of 308 people by U K’s Rubik brand limited was holding the record so far.

Rishinath from Guinness organization who was stationed as adjudicator for the last four days verified and confirmed the achievement, announced the record and handed over the certificate to H Sharankumar, principal of the school. Siddi educational institute’s Ramadevi R Bhat, vice president H Balachandra Bhat, management official Veena Rashmi, Guinness record guide Prathwish K, management board’s Dr N P Narayana Shetty and vice principal Rama Devadiga were present.

As many as 50 students of the school had created on November 30 the picture of national Hockey player major Dhyanchand in an area of 19.198 square meters using 6,000 cubes on one side and dual sided rotating Rubik’s cube mosaic picture of international badminton player P V Sindhu on the other side and broken the record of Zengis Aitzanov who had created the picture with an area of 15.878 square meters using 5,100 cubes.

source/content: daijiworld.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL/ NATIONAL/ KARNATAKA: Bengaluru Scientist Prof Urbasi Singh, 1st Indian Scientist to get Canadian Excellence Research Chair (CERC) Award, Wins USD 8 million grant

Prof Urbasi specialises in quantum science and her research interests span cutting-edge topical areas such as quantum communication, quantum computation, quantum optics and quantum fundamentals.

Prof Urbasi Singh from the Quantum Information and Computing (QuIC) laboratory at the Raman Research Institute (RRI), Bengaluru, is the first Indian scientist to be awarded Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Photonic Quantum Science and Technologies.

She won a grant worth $8 million, opening possibilities for international interactions in academia, industry and other sectors developing lab-to-market innovative models — for building a future ecosystem based on quantum technologies.

Prof Urbasi specialises in quantum science and her research interests span cutting-edge topical areas such as quantum communication, quantum computation, quantum optics and quantum fundamentals and information processing.

Her lab is one of the first in India to manufacture and establish the usage of heralded and entangled photon sources towards various applications in quantum technologies.

source/content: newindianexpress.com (headline edited)

NATIONAL / KARNATAKA: BIOLOGICAL SCIENCE: How a Space for Biological Sciences shaped up in Bengaluru

An event at National Centre for Biological Sciences traced the premier institute’s genesis and growth over the last two and a half decades.

U.B. Poornima, the first resident architect of the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), remembers what the campus was like in 1994 when she first landed there.

“The compound wall construction was already done, and a sump was being laid,” she recalls. But the land, back then, was barren, a far cry from today’s bustling, verdant campus. “Only snakes were seen crawling around,” she says at “Building (for) Biology: The NCBS Campus”, an event that consisted of a historical campus walk, followed by a talk that delved into the genesis of the institute and its campus.

Nostalgia and memory, often tinctured with humour, repeatedly made their way into this event, part of a public lecture series regularly held by the Archives at NCBS that sought to “understand the environment built for doing science, how space shapes the culture of science, and how science, too, is shaped by the space it inhabits,” as the event’s invitation put it, adding that the campus walkthrough is an experiment in seeing the space as a historical site.

Insights and changes

Peppered with insights from these campus members and enlivened by questions from curious audience members, the walk ended up becoming a freewheeling discussion on various aspects of the campus, ranging from the rationale behind the lovely view of the lawns at the Simons Centre for the Study of Living Machines to how the pond on campus became one, about the first set of buildings designed by the Delhi-based architect Raj Rewal and the curious case of how the Godrej locks in campus housing could once be opened with a single key (a mistake that was rectified).

“A lot of changes have happened since we moved into the campus … people grew, space grew, a lot more occupants in the building,” says Poornima, while T.M. Sahadevan, who served as the first administrative officer at NCBS, lingers on the somewhat serendipitous origins of the campus.

“There were a lot of problems,” he says, recalling how when the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) first approached the government of Karnataka, wanting to set up NCBS in Bengaluru, they were told that no more expansion in Bengaluru was possible since Hosur was already putting a load on Bangalore back then.

“Then someone suggested that we ask GKVK,” he says, adding that this came through. “We got 20 acres of land and took over in February,” remembers Sahadevan, the first TIFR person to set foot on campus back in 1991.

Admittedly, the event was somewhat unstructured, unearthing the memories and lived experiences of some of its past and present campus members rather than a linear building biography. Still, it succeeded in leaving attendees more enlightened (and often amused) by the end.

A 25-year-old history

According to the NCBS website, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) has been directly or indirectly responsible for forming at least six research institutions in the country, of which NCBS is one.

While the initial proposal made in 1982, following a suggestion made by Prof. S. Ramaseshan, the then Director of the Indian Institute of Science, was to have a joint TIFR-IISc Centre on the IISc campus, this did not reach fruition. Then, in 1984, the Planning Commission agreed to fund a centre for fundamental research in biological sciences at Bangalore, functioning as “an autonomous unit under the aegis of TIFR and conduct fundamental research and teaching in areas of biology at the frontiers of knowledge,” as the website notes. The next few years were spent scouting for an appropriate place to set up, culminating in this 20-odd-acre campus leased from the University of Agricultural Sciences, with an MOU signed in 1991.

While NCBS technically celebrated its 25^th anniversary in October 2016 since it spent its first few years at the TIFR Centre at the Indian Institute of Science Campus before moving to its current location, people began trickling in by 1998 or so.

“Depending on who you speak to, people have been living in this space for around 25 years,” says Venkat Srinivasan, who heads the Archives at NCBS, at the talk that followed the campus walk. Though he agrees it is only a rough estimate, he adds, “It is a good moment to reflect on the physical space that you inhabit daily.”

Extraordinarily particular

In this talk, augmented by audio interviews, old photographs, documents and interjections by the faculty members who were also part of the audience, Srinivasan traced the institute’s genesis and growth over the last two and a half decades. From an audio clip of an interview with Obaid Siddiqi, the co-founder and first director of NCBS, that reflects on the idea of NCBS to documents detailing the nitty-gritty aspects of lease and construction and old photographs reflecting the barrenness of the land before the institute came into being, the talk’s biggest takeaway was this. “How extraordinarily particular this group of individuals were at getting what they wanted,” he puts it.

Poornima, who was deeply entrenched in the construction process right from the start, is wont to agree. In most government institutions, she points out, the final users of the buildings, too busy with their research, give the architects instructions in one go, which goes on to be developed by the latter. In this case, however, the users were deeply involved in the process from the start to the finish. “They took away time from research and were involved at every stage,” she remembers. “They knew what they wanted.”

source/content: thehindu.com (headline edited)

KARNATAKA: EDUCATION / CYBER SECURITY: National Cybersecurity Centre of Excellence set up at SJB Institute of Technology (SJBIT) in Bengaluru

Dr K V Mahendra Prashanth, Principal of SJBIT, said that the partnership with NICC will prepare students in the digital age.

Aimed at reaching a significant milestone in the field of cybersecurity education and research in India, the National Information and Cybersecurity Council (NICC) announced the establishment of the National Cybersecurity Centre of Excellence at SJB Institute of Technology (Autonomous) (SJBIT).

Stating that the centre, which is said to be the first-of-its-kind in Karnataka, will play a pivotal role in fighting cyber threats and improving the nation’s cybersecurity capabilities, Dr Prakashnath Swamiji, Managing Director, BGS and SJB Group of Institutions, said, “The centre will provide advanced cybersecurity training to students, professionals and different organisations. It will provide cutting-edge research which will strengthen national cybersecurity.”

He said that the centre will also have partnerships with various industries and have a community outreach to raise awareness about cybersecurity and also help students in job placement.

Dr K V Mahendra Prashanth, Principal of SJBIT, said that the partnership with NICC will prepare students in the digital age.

The programmes under this initiative will benefit students from various educational institutions from Karnataka and other states. “This partnership with SJBIT reflects our collective dedication to nurturing cybersecurity expertise and enhancing the nation’s cybersecurity posture,” said P Arjun, head of research and operations at NICC.

source/content: newindianexpress.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL / NATIONAL – KARNATAKA: Bengaluru-based students get United Nations (UN) Recognition for efforts to tackle poverty on October 17th the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

United Nations (UN) has recognised the efforts of Bengaluru-based students to tackle poverty among internal migrants in India, on the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

The United Nations (UN) has recognised the efforts of Bengaluru-based students to tackle poverty among internal migrants in India, on the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, October 17.

Kristu Jayanti College, a member institution of the United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) in India, introduced an ‘adult literacy and migrant labour’ as a general elective this academic year to create better understanding of community-related issues.

Under the leadership of Assistant Professor Dr Juby Thomas, students analysed employment stability, emotional well-being, financial literacy, substance abuse, digital safety awareness, food and nutrition, among the internal migrants. This research provides a grassroots-level understanding of issues affecting internal migrant communities, emphasising the need for all-round support. “The efforts of these students are a testament to the potential of higher education institutions to drive positive change,” he explained.

In the second phase, students designed awareness campaigns. “Our students started a campaign with the theme Sip Right, Live Bright, to empower internal migrants to access and utilise safe and clean water sources. This initiative seeks to educate migrants on purifying water independently,” Dr Augustine George, Principal of Kristu Jayanti College, said.

Through live demonstrations, students could explain the usage of simple purification methods. Students are designing adult literacy plans in the third phase, understanding how adults equipped to read, write and comprehend information can access opportunities. Rudri Dave, Department of Psychology, said, “Through this course, I have learned that comprehending human behaviour and motivation is essential when tackling social and public health issues.”

source/content: newindianexpress.com (headline edited)

KARNATAKA : SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGH: C-CAMP announces Centre of Excellence in Antimicrobial Resistance Innovation with SBI Foundation

According to C-CAMP, AMR has been identified by World Health Organisation (WHO) as one of the top ten global health threats claiming 7,00,000 lives per year globally with a projected fatality rate of 10 million per year by 2050.

The Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP), a biotech research and innovation hub in Bengaluru, Friday announced the establishment of a Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) innovations with SBI Foundation, a CSR subsidiary of the State of India.

This project is aimed at addressing global health threats by providing a structured platform for support systems that include funding and frameworks to advance the development, translation and scale-up of indigenous deep science entrepreneurships in the AMR domain.

“While India is one of the leading nations from the Global South in research towards AMR mitigation, deep science entrepreneurial efforts to deliver these emerging solutions from bench to bedside have shown a serious lacuna. This unaddressed gap is now the focus of a new partnership between C-CAMP and SBI Foundation. The project will establish a CoE in AMR innovation by providing a structured platform for support systems and frameworks to advance the development, translation and scale-up of indigenous deep science entrepreneurships in the AMR domain,” C-CAMP said in a release.

Prof Ajay Sood, Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, said, “The AMR poses a grave challenge to public health systems across the world and is a WHO priority. Paradoxically, AMR is one of the least funded domains in biotechnology due to its skewed market economics. Funding and handholding support for this deep science sector by the C-CAMP-SBIF CoE will be a tremendous boost for AMR innovation development.”

C-CAMP Director-CEO Dr Taslimarif Saiyed said, “We are excited to ring in our latest partnership with SBI Foundation. This is a crucial PPP collaboration through which we will address AMR by supporting ventures that develop and commercialise scientific breakthroughs and innovations for on-field impact. As the latest ICMR study on AMR showed, last-resort antibiotics like carbapenems are beginning to fail in hospital-acquired infections in ICUs with signs of locally resistant strains emerging. This implies a dire need for indigenous solutions tailored for Indian conditions which this CoE will help identify and support.”

Sanjay Prakash, Managing Director, SBI Foundation, said he is confident that the CoE for AMR Innovation will be the cornerstone in identifying, funding and nurturing startups leading the AMR Innovations.

The CoE will be under the aegis of the global India AMR Innovation hub (IAIH) also anchored by C-CAMP and chaired by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser. The focus of the CoE will be on identifying and supporting through funding and other means, a 360 degree portfolio of cutting-edge deep-science solutions, across AMR and the larger One Health domain spanning Food and Agriculture, Environment and Healthcare.

The CoE plans to kick off its operations by identifying and nurturing up to 12 innovations in the next two years.

source/content: indianexpress.com (headline edited)