All India Radio Address on Science Day

Science ignites the young

Dear listeners of All India Radio and students, my greetings to all of you. I am indeed very happy to talk to you on this Science Day, which is celebrated on 28th February every year, to commemorate the discovery of the Raman Effect by the Nobel Laureate, Sir C.V. Raman. He brought many laurels to this country by his path breaking research in physics. It is a great occasion to pay tribute to scientists, who are toiling hard to discover the unknown that may light our lives.

Science plays a very important part in providing important knowledge for generating technologies that ultimately enrich the quality of lives of billions of people. Science also has its own beauty when pursued in its purest form. When a scientist attempts to explain the beauty of nature, the work results into celebrated discoveries such as Raman?s explanation of blue sky, Chandrasekar?s explanation of the black hole. Science also ignites the minds of the young people to dream, evolve new thoughts leading them to action. Today, I would like to share with you particularly the young people of the country, four important scientific challenges before us right now: The Nano Science, Stem Cell Research, Mars exploration and Application of Science for societal transformation. Though every aspect of science is challenging, I have chosen these four areas to provoke the minds of the parents and teachers, for inculcating and promoting the scientific temper among the children and students and to motivate them to pursue purposeful scientific career in their future life. What better gift can science get than the ignited minds of our youth?

The statement of the Nobel laureate physicist Prof. Richard Feynman, ?There is plenty of room at the bottom?, illustrates the exciting possibilities in the emerging area of Nano-structured materials. Understanding and exploiting them is the big challenge being pursued by scientists today.

Devices and materials have been shrinking rapidly over the past few decades and it is estimated that by 2010, the size of computers would be of the order of Nano, which is equivalent to ten to the power of minus nine. The future computers would be built with Nano sized materials would work at Brahma?s speed (teraflops) and would communicate at the speed of lightning (Terabits per second) and would store the knowledge of the entire universe in a small (Hiranya) cube.

When I look at the deep and beautiful colors on the feathers of the peacock in the Rastrapati Bhavan, I have often wondered how even after many years, the color of the peacock feather does not fade away. I recall as a young kid, I used to keep peacock feathers in my books. This phenomenon of long lasting original color to the peacock has come from the God?s own creation of Nano materials, coated in a peacocks feather and they diffract light, which gives us the rich colors. Observation of the nature and the role of science in understanding it from our research in Nano sciences can be converted into a technological product by using the same or similar Nano materials which gave the natural color for the peacock feather, as part of our shirts, sarees, fabric and apparels. It is a welcome destination for science to mature into technology and become a product of utility for the society.

Nano science gives scientists the ability to manipulate matter at the atomic and molecular levels. Nano materials are not about miniaturization. When the materials are in the Nano regime, it opens up a very interesting challenge to basic physics and chemistry. This challenging research world over has demonstrated that by making the same material in the Nano scales, you could get materials with unimaginable, and useful properties. This means, in the near future, scientists will be able to develop methods to make very minute materials for a variety of applications.

In medicine, for example, it would be possible to detect cancerous tumors when they are very miniscule or only a few cells in size. This knowledge, in turn, could lead to early detection and possible cure of the person with minimal discomfort. The ?Nano-computer?, which has been developed by scientists at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel, is one of the best examples of these minute products and their potential. The biological nanocomputer is a device that is pieced together using a trillion living cells, acting together and with the capability to perform billion operations per second. The exciting device is a combination of the enormous crunching power of the computers and biological molecules that can be programmed to perform different tasks in an autonomous way.

Prof. CNR Rao's research team at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), in collaboration with researchers at the Indian Institute of Sciences (IISc), Bangalore, has developed inorganic nanotubes and nano wires. In another related development, a bamboo cone nanotube has also been fabricated. These nanotubes, which were first discovered in 1990, have potential applications in electronics. By making bundles of nanotubes, it is possible to have highly efficient electronic display and flat-bed displays in TVs. More applications are on the anvil.

Another interesting lead from Indian scientists is in the area of nanotubes of the junction ?Y' type. This manipulated version can be used as a transistor. We can have a large number of Y or T-junction nanotubes or nanochips that have the properties of a diode and explore the potential applications. Nano science has exciting potential in futuristic applications in medicine, genomics, electronics, energy, molecular electronics, very sophisticated chemical analysis, drug development etc.

Nano crystal light

Dr. R.N. Bhargava, CEO of Nano-Crystal Imaging Corporation, USA who has plans to establish a lamp factory in India came and met me at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. He demonstrated to me a very optimal and efficient lighting system based on Nano crystals. The recent advances in semi conductor based lighting chips ? Light Emitting Diodes (LED) can provide six hours of reliable light to every home or shop in a village at virtually no recurring energy cost and minimum installation cost. These LEDs require a tiny fraction of energy used for other forms of lighting. LED based lighting can be easily provided with solar panels or foot pedal generators. For nearly 40 years LEDs were weak color light sources (Green, Amber and Red) used mostly as indicators and numeric light. LED technology in recent years has improved dramatically. Today LEDs, using 10 watt of power could produce light equivalent to a sixty-watt filament lamp. Filament lamps are highly inefficient since 90% of the energy is dissipated as heat, Fluorescent lamps are more efficient but still waste energy by heating gases, where as LEDs convert energy to light very efficiently. Typical LED lamps burn over 10 years or longer, they withstand much greater temperature changes, mechanical vibrations and shock. They are reliable and fade away slowly and there is no sudden stoppage of light.

New discoveries in Nano technology make LEDs much brighter and make the products less expensive, which can revolutionize rural electrification for lighting. The field is fertile for research and development of high efficient and low cost LEDs, using Nano-Crystal.

Stem Cell therapy for future heart ailments

Dear friends, I would like to share with you some of the emerging areas in stem cell research. In one of the experiments, tens of thousands of immature stem cells, which are capable of transforming themselves into almost any kind of tissues, had been drawn from the suffering patients and injected into their hearts to stimulate heart repair. In one case, it is reported that the pumping efficiency has increased from 25% to 40% over a period of four months. In 2003, successful stem cell procedures that resulted in measurable boost in blood pumping capacity have increased substantially in many countries across the globe. This holds a big promise for effective heart repair for ailing people.

During my visit to various laboratories, I happened to see the beginning of stem cell research for different purposes including brain research. I would like to describe an important stem cell research application in the field of cardiology. Famous cardiovascular and thoracic surgeon Dr. P. Venugopal, Director - All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) told me that in one of the cardiac diseases, where conventional medical and surgical treatments were ineffective because of the affliction of the heart muscle, use of autologous bone marrow stem cells implantation into the diseased heart muscles had been applied to improve the function of heart muscles. This kind of stem cell application in this procedure is the latest and very few cases have been done in the world and the first in India. This is expected to open up new frontiers in the treatment of patients for regeneration of heart muscles, thereby giving new hope for the patients suffering from end stage heart disease.

Stem Cell for Restoration of Vision

The recent identification and characterization of progenitors with stem cell properties has opened new avenues that may be useful for treating functional impairments caused by the death of specific cell population. Stromal and neuronal degeneration are the causes of debilitating visual impairment associated with many ocular diseases, such as degenerative diseases of cornea, retinitis pigmentosa (RP), age- related mascular degeneration (AMD) and glaucoma. The stem cells may help restore vision in patient who has these diseases, by repopulating or rescuing the damaged ocular surface cells or retinal cells from further degeneration.

The stem cell research team headed by Prof. Tara Prasad Das at LV Prasad Eye Institute has administered stem cells in the affected region of the eye for over 175 patients; some of them seriously affected by fire accidents and all of them are performing very well. This research has also helped many patients from neighbouring countries.

Mars Exploration

I witnessed the spectacle of the red planet Mars in the midnight on 29 Aug 2003, with my friends through a telescope at Rashtrapati Bhavan. On that day, Mars was closest to the earth. The beautiful and colourful features of Mars in the southern sky and our expanding universe inspired me. Mars was inviting all our scientists to explore. I am convinced that Mars will become a sought after planet for human exploration for wealth and habitat, in a few decades. New technological advances in space research, material science, communication and transportation technology will make it possible. India's moon mission can pave the way for the next challenging mission to Mars.

The big scientific question towards the Mars Exploration is how the water activity in the past on Mars has influenced the red planet's environment over time. While presently liquid water has not been found on the surface of Mars, the past record of water activity on Mars can be found in the rocks, minerals, and geologic landforms, particularly in those that can only form in the presence of water. That's why NASA?s Rovers are specially equipped with tools to study a diverse collection of rocks and soils that may hold clues to past water activity on Mars. The Rovers will offer unique contributions in pursuit of the overall Mars science strategy to "Follow the Water." Understanding the history of water on Mars is important for: Determining whether life ever arose on Mars, Characterizing the climate of Mars, Characterizing the Geology of Mars and Preparing for Human Exploration. Robot geologists can provide the much-needed first explorations on our pursuit to locate the signs of water activity on Mars.

I visualize, in another 50 years time, the results of inter planetary science leading to a human habitat, Industrial activity and above all the non-conventional energy generation, and space farming. The world space community will realize the necessity for international co-operation for this great mission. India by her unique position in the world of space research, would be able to contribute to this co-operation by sharing technologies, research and astronauts.

Application of Science for Societal transformation

Dear friends, we will now see how some of the interesting applications of science can improve the quality of life of the differently abled persons.

Cochlear Implant Research: Cochlear implant helps the deaf and dumb individuals to regain near normal hearing/speaking capabilities. Basically it is by-passing the damaged inner ear portion by replacing its functions with an electronic system having external mike, speech processing circuit, transmitter and a receiver. The receiver is implanted below the ear. The receiver has an electrode which will be inserted into the cochlear portion of the ear. Speech processor processes the input audio signals and converts them into electrical signals in various channels. The transmitter transmits these signals to the implant's multi-channel electrode which terminates in various points of the cochlear. At a Hospital in Coimbatore, I saw children who could hear and converse after implanting and subsequent IT aided training. The cost of imported cochlear implant is around Rupees 7 lakhs which common man cannot afford. One important area of concern in India is that we do not have low cost Cochlear Implant manufacturing units. Series of research and development activities should be initiated to establish Cochlear Implant manufacturing capabilities in India with the objective of bringing down the cost of all components, surgery and postoperative training to around a few thousands of rupees. Our R&D Laboratories and industries should co-operate and bring out the products before 2005. They should ensure that the technologies for differently challenged people are brought to the people with the motto of ?right technology at the right time and all the time?.

Neuro sciences and Mentally Challenged: When I was associated with Anna University in Chennai some time back, apart from my teaching activities on various societal transformation missions, I was guiding a doctoral research project. The research was aimed to find integrated solution using software; hardware application to achieve a near normal functioning of the brain of mentally challenged children. When I saw some of the mentally challenged children performing certain activities like singing, painting in Central Institute of Mental Retardation, Thiruvananthapuram, I got convinced that one day convergence of information and communication technology, medical electronics, Bio and Nano technology and mathematical simulation can find a solution in the form of either non-intrusive solution or an inexpensive intelligent implant. We studied the mentally challenged children in various institutions, homes for mentally retarded and hospitals. We are confident that it will be possible to transfer the functions of the damaged portion of the brain say left hemisphere, to the normal portion (right hemisphere) of the brain by some triggering mechanism, or by implanting a biochip to carryout those functions. This is a complex problem, which needs an integrated approach involving medical scientists, sociologists and technologists for a researched solution, which can help children and the aged alike, afflicted with this mental disability. The world would witness very stunning advances in this area if ever the convergence between the neuro sciences research and stem cells research takes place.

Conclusion

Discovery in science provides the greatest satisfaction and happiness to the individual scientists. When Einstein discovered the theory of relativity and the equation E=Mc2, when Sir CV Raman discovered the Raman Effect that Molecular Scattering is the reason for ocean to be blue, and when Subramanyam Chandrasekar discovered Black hole, it virtually led bliss for all these scientists. All these scientists probably never thought of the magnitude of the application of their discoveries at the time they discovered it. The nuclear energy, light spectroscopy, calculation of the life of the sun, all was understood subsequently due to these scientific discoveries. The science leads to development of technologies. Availability of technologies leads to products. It should be the mission of our budding scientists to see that they make scientific discoveries, which will lay the foundation for future technologies of the country leading to new cost effective products for our billion plus people, and also increasing the wealth of the nation.

Dear young friends, I am sure all of you will be looking forward to pursuing science as a career with passion to meet the challenges and derive happiness through providing better quality of life to your brethren.

On this day, let me have the pleasure of wishing you, the future of my country, many successes in your scientific efforts and missions.

My best wishes to all of you.