19 till I die

I’m a Post Doc from the National Center for Biological Sciences at Bengaluru in India. I’ve been looking for faculty positions in Biology within India because I sense my talents, motivation and training can make an impact on many students’ lives and research here. Elsewhere, I’d be more replaceable than I am here. Also, the need for committed trainers in India is much greater at this time. The Covid crisis precipitated in March and we are in August. So to speak, the crisis has disrupted many hiring and funding decisions. However, my peers and I have been applying for positions since July 2019. I’d like to share my experiences first and share inferences after. In my opinion teaching and research go hand in hand. The thrill of finding things out must be supplemented with the ability to train others to formulate original questions, using methods and techniques, analysis, critical thinking and communication skills. For that reason I chose IITs and IISERs as my first choice as host institut...

I wrote this article to participate in the AWSAR 2019 competition. Turns out previous years' winners can't apply. So here it is for everyone. Consider the value your muscles bring to your life? Imagine for second, whatever you did since this morning. Now picture doing it without using any muscles. Unless you were sleeping and completely still, not a twitch or blink of the eye, you depended on your muscles. Arguably, working muscles are as important to quality of life as a working brain. Some people lack this luxury. Due to genetic mutations running in some families, members lose their muscles at different stages of life. This condition is called muscular dystrophy. A close friend of mine was training to be a fast bowler in the Ranji trophy, in his late teens. A decade since the onset of muscular dystrophy, picking a cup of tea, a laptop out of his bag or himself out a chair are formidable tasks. He would have made an excellent fast bowler. Maybe you know someone who has or ...

All over the world, many fresh PhD graduates face an existential crisis, deeply despairing at their prospects. A post-doctoral fellowship can be a voluntary exercise in sapping one’s soul. We’re bursting with research ideas and energy with few outlets and sometimes nothing to show for them. Meltdowns are imminent and many have precipitated. I want to share my experiences here at home, in India, that have been personally and intellectually rewarding while shining a light on the contributions I can make. I garnered these experiences by stepping away from the bench occasionally to teach and train students around me. Finding out new things about the world we live in, makes me tick. Conveying knowledge by sparking curiosity and thought, carries me between these often infrequent and tiny but glorious flashes of discovery. As a post-doc in a research institute, one has to seek out opportunities to teach. In the past four years, I have taught students from small towns in India onlin...

This article was selected for an AWSAR award in 2019. I still haven't seen it published anywhere. So, I'm putting this out here too. For about 60 years we have known about stem cells that repair muscles in mammals. We were sure insect muscles don’t use stem cells to repair themselves. But no one showed if and how insect muscles do repair themselves. This article discusses how the discovery of adult muscle stem cells in Fruit Flies was made. We all get hurt from time to time. You might bruise a knee, break a bone or burn a finger. Our bodies possess the marvelous ability to largely repair these injuries. The ability to repair body tissues is not limited just to humans.   In multicellular life-forms, like ants and elephants (and us too), there are mechanisms by which one cell senses injury in its vicinity ( Doğaner B et al, Trends in Cell Biology 2016) . Once this cell and other cells near the site of injury sense that there is a wound and it needs repair, they oft...

I had written this article to communicate the science behind this study a year ago. A friend was going to publish it, but it hasn't happened yet. So I figured I might as well put this out here. At a very basic level, our brains compute our reactions to sounds, smells, tastes and problems in communication/mathematics and decision making of all kinds at the very highest levels. What makes this computer work? What are the circuits in our brain that make any of this even possible? Some sensations make our bodies react immediately. Most of us cringe at the sound of nails on a chalkboard, pull away our fingers from hot pans and jump if we step on a sharp pin. Smoke makes us cough. We’ve all squinted, wrinkled our faces and puckered at the first taste of lemon juice as babies. We don’t think about our reactions. They just happen. But, if you do think about it, these reflexes aren’t that simple. Messages carrying information about a screeching sound, hot pan and sour juice need...

This morning, after some good work at the bench, two people working with me wanted to discuss something. This wasn't the regular, I'm not sure how to do this experiment, or have those flies arrived?, or can I take the day off ? This was one of those sombre sit downs. First, they both asked for time off. I thought to myself "Phew... That was easy." I was happy to get going from there, but a heavy question followed. One of them said they wanted to pursue a PhD in cancer biology. "OK, they are leaving this group I guess.". But then one of them spoke about how much they want to do a PhD and nothing has panned out in many many years and that it was too late, and that they are dependent on their fiancé, and how much that is a burden on their conscience, and they've tried many different fields, and they want to stay in academics and not go to industry... The stream of thought was unbroken, and gained strength like their tears. Finally they asked "What...

This question is not new. People have questioned each other and themselves before. My wife asked me where I am from this week. My coworkers weighed in. Their opinions about where I am from differed from mine. I couldn’t change their mind. Our marriage was arranged. My parents wanted me to marry someone in our own community. Here’s how we think of ourselves. My community is rabidly vegetarian. We eat no onion or garlic. People I know won’t eat jackfruit or mushrooms because they look like meat. There are festivals we celebrate in addition to Holi and Diwali in a very traditional, and to me, very dear way. Our roots lie in Agra district. And can’t really tell you what other badges and sashes I think we wear. Two generations separate me from Bateshwar, the village which my grandfather left behind for Indore. Papa left Indore about 15 years before I was born. Papa is fond of Indore, rather of what Indore was. Amma grew up in Lucknow and doesn’t speak fondly of it. She speaks only...

I'm writing this out at the start of a work day. It could be because of a story on this American life I heard about an imminent death in some other family. It could be because, though I've been in the same country as my parents, I haven't had a chance to stay with them for more than a total of five days. The feeling of being with family is dearer to me than all parties and thrills of flirtation put together. With Amma, Papa and Noshi there is a sense of predictability that comes from familiarity. I know how much to say and when to be quiet. I know the jokes that Papa will appreciate and ones Noshi will. Listening to Amma gives me a sense of purpose in itself. It doesn't look like anyone else ever does. The predictability was the monotony I wanted to run away from when college began. I seek it now. Though we talk on the phone everyday, it's less than satisfying. I think of how Papa and his siblings hangout when we get together at weddings. Papa is the middle chil...

It was Republic Day yesterday. My heart swells with pride and my eyes well with tears when I hear a crowd singing "Jana Gana Mana". Whistling Vande Mataram gives me the same peace as prayer. I've expressed often how much I like being in my country, with my people, my languages, my music and food. My stay abroad reminded me how much I need them in my life. There'd be talk in the ether, never in my immediate surroundings, how foreigners shouldn't come to our great nation, in the US. We all, my colleagues and friends of any background, thought of people as ignorant and closed minded. And yet, I didn't know I had a bit of Xenophobia in me. The other day, about a month go, in IIT Kanpur, some friends and I were lounging over coffee. There was a caucasian gentleman at a table nearby. I was telling some story about accents... or the tightness of families... or something else, I can't remember. I described someone of English descent as Firangi. A friend of min...

In this day and age where finding a spouse is tough, (or has is always been so?) bowing to the needs of the family complicates matters. I hold the need to keep my parents close to me throughout my life, very close to my heart. And yet, I don't see how they can possibly judge for me who would best be my companion for life. And so, we've agreed on their suggesting girls that they approve of and me speaking to them for some length time to know whether we click. Through this process, I met someone who is, what I thought was all I can ask for in a girl. I mentioned to close cousins that all I ask is a workable roommate. Talking to people has corrected that notion. The girl I was speaking of, picked the profession she wanted to pursue early on, studied in lofty institutions, is independent and knows what she wants from life. Dream spouse, if you had asked me many months ago. When we met, no sparks flew on either side. To expect them to have, would have been adolescent. Thanks t...

A good first impression is easy to make, Sustaining it is the problem.

Waking up in summers across the world means different things. In Delhi, if you sleep on the roof in a mosquito net, you wake up drowning in your sweat. On a jute string cot in Khategaon district in Madhya Pradesh, you wake up at 5 to flies droning loudly around your face. The flies must've been explorers in their last incarnation. They love the uncharted territory of your nostrils. In Sweden, you can see the Sun. Isn't that nice!? The Sun is not much of a problem here, in Bengaluru like it is say, in Hyderabad. Waking up in Bengaluru summers can be like waking up in a season different from the one in which you slept. I remember my first day in the new flat I rented. The landlord overlooked putting the fans up. It was a sultry night. Opening all the windows helped with ventilation a little, at least from the sides where a building doesn't stand at a handshake distance. The one hallway in the flat, between the bedroom and living room seemed coolest. That's where I spre...