From One Mind to Many: The Making of Great Science

About the Lecture — Modern science found fertile ground in India in the late 19^th and early 20^th century, with brilliant individuals like J. C. Bose, C. V. Raman, S. Ramanujan, S. N. Bose, Bibha Chaudhuri and many others contributing path-breaking discoveries at the frontiers of their subjects. After independence, many institutions were created, and government support for science grew substantially. The tradition of individual excellence has continued, with many notable figures leaving their mark on global science. Yet I would argue that we have not been particularly successful in correspondingly scaling up these numbers. In my view, this stems from insufficient attention to both institutional structures and the societal linkages that foster truly creative thinking. A strong imperative of the present period, then, is to evolve Indian science from a story of scattered successes to one of systematic cultivation of excellence. I note many promising signs of this course correction, signs that now need to be strengthened further.

About the Speaker — Prof. Rajesh Gopakumar is an eminent theoretical physicist whose work helps decode the nature of quantum gravity. He serves as Director of the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences (ICTS-TIFR), Bengaluru, where he is a Distinguished Professor. 

He obtained his integrated M.Sc. in physics from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur in 1992 and his PhD from Princeton University in 1997, under the supervision of Nobel laureate David Gross. After a research stint at Harvard University, he joined the Harish-Chandra Research Institute, Allahabad, in 2001 before moving to ICTS. 

His research lies at the intersection of string theory and quantum field theory. His work led to the Gopakumar – Vafa duality and the Gopakumar – Vafa invariants. Among many honours, he has received the ICTP Prize and the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award.