With a view to motivate youngsters to shape their career in the field of Science, the Infosys Science Foundation (ISF) awarded the Infosys Prize 2019 to six researchers in different fields including Engineering and Computer Science, Humanities, Life Sciences, Mathematical Sciences, Physical Sciences and Social Sciences. A panel of jurors comprising renowned scholars and professors shortlisted the winners of Infosys Prize 2019 from 196 nominations. The awardees were felicitated with a gold medal, citation and a prize purse of USD 100,000.
N R Narayana Murthy, Infosys founder and Trustee of the Infosys Science Foundation, said, “We should start helping our youngsters pursue fundamental research enthusiastically. They should be encouraged and equipped to become contributors to solving huge problems that confront us every day. I want India to be a place where discovery and invention happen every month.”
Here is the list of winners from six categories:
Engineering and Computer Science
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Engineering and Computer Science has been awarded to Sunita Sarawagi, Institute Chair Professor, Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay for her research in databases, data mining, machine learning and natural language processing, and for important applications of these research techniques. The prize recognizes her pioneering work in developing information extraction techniques for unstructured data. Prof Sarawagi’s work has practical applications in helping clean up unstructured data like addresses on the web and in repositories which then helps in more efficient handling of queries.
Humanities
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Humanities has been awarded to Manu V Devadevan, Assistant Professor, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology, Mandi for his original and wide-ranging work on pre-modern South India. He critically reinterprets much of the conventional wisdom about the cultural, religious and social history of the Deccan and South India. Dr Devadevan's primary research interests include political and economic processes in pre-modern South India, literary practices in South India and the study of ancient inscriptions from the region.
Life Sciences
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Life Sciences has been awarded to Manjula Reddy, Chief Scientist, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad for her groundbreaking discoveries concerning the structure of cell walls in bacteria. Dr Reddy and her colleagues have revealed critical steps of cell wall growth that are fundamental for understanding bacterial biology. This work could potentially help in creating a new class of antibiotics to combat antibiotic resistant microbes.
Mathematical Sciences
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Mathematical Sciences is awarded to Siddhartha Mishra, Professor, Department of Mathematics, ETH Zürich, for his outstanding contributions to Applied Mathematics, particularly for designing numerical tools for solving problems in the real world. Prof. Mishra's work has been used in climate models, in astrophysics, aerodynamics, and plasma physics. He has produced codes for complicated realistic problems such as tsunamis generated by rock slides, and waves in the solar atmosphere.
Physical Sciences
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Physical Sciences is awarded to G Mugesh, Professor, Department of Inorganic and Physical Chemistry, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru for his seminal work in the chemical synthesis of small molecules and nanomaterials for biomedical applications. His work has contributed to the understanding of the role of trace elements, selenium and iodine, in thyroid hormone activation and metabolism, and this research has led to major medical advances.
Social Sciences
The Infosys Prize 2019 for Social Sciences is awarded to Anand Pandian, Professor, Department of Anthropology, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Johns Hopkins University for his imaginative work on ethics, selfhood and the creative process. Prof Pandian's research encompasses several themes such as cinema, public culture, ecology, nature and the theory and methods of anthropology. His writing pushes the boundaries of how anthropologists render into words the worlds they encounter. His work breaks new ground.
