Adieu Professor N G Prasad but not Dasvidanya

At first impression you seemed to be strict well versed stereotyped English Gentleman, seemed a bit strict. Got known from others you were the Fly man. At that time I could not have spelled Drosophila. In class I was at first could not understand your lectures.
It was really low ebb time for me personally. I was lost, I had no goals. I did not know what is research? Why I was at IISER Kolkata? Frankly speaking I had lost all the motivations what I had gained in my school. I was just freaking out. No desire, no aim, just roaming around as a young rascal. I was not doing well in class. never able to generate any project idea. always thought what we had read was not enough to generate any so called "crazy" idea.
Slowly got involved with you through you in Fly lab, found that you were soft spoken. What I liked most was that you were ready to listen any thing. My friends went to you and talked to you you listened to them, they got motivated to do project with you.
One day I also went to you with Abhiket, I told you all my frustrations and apprehensions , you listened all and encouraged me.
Slowly after some interactive seasons I got encouraged and I got motivated that it was not all end but just new begining. You told me to do project under me as I was too vunerable to think in Project. Project idea was to find effect of nutrition value female fly. I could have ever thought that with these flies you can do such kind of project. It helped me to break my view that all research work was not flashy, all research work was simple ball game but you have to have right tools to test them. I had no interest in biology earlier. Though in school I was member of Life science Hobby Class as most of my friends were in this Hobby class. At this point of time Dr. Swadhin sir encouraged me to join his Lab synthesizing Nanoparticles and utilizing it as catalyst in C-C coupling reactions. I was enjoynig both the Labs.
Though at certain times found it was waste of time and energy cooking food for flies. Through the project I gained patience. You were ready to help me in understanding each and every time. I can remember one morning I was having trouble handling Carbon Dioxide cylinder, when I called you, you came rushing from your me.
You encouraged to learn Research articles. Earlier I feared to read them, as they all seemed to be of high level and of no use. You also sent me articles whose link i sent to you. You thought how handling Drosophila will help understanding Human conditions. It was all fancy for me.
though i have not taken biology as my major, but now I am learning the art of research from your point of view. I can now search papers of my choice quite well now, which I could not have dream of doing a year back.
The way you encouraged me to present the project presentation was quite amazing. Earlier I was focusing on setting background with beautiful templates only. You though you can co-relate your subject matter with any artifact, you encouraged to present presentation as a star war theme, I liked it. you taught me how to write point wise in presentation. Though I did not got very good marks in that presentations, I cannot blame to you for that. But from there after I am able to co-relate my presentations with simple life experiences like I dream pt to present my experience in Nanoparticles as joy one child gets by playing Snakes & ladder. I have now learnt to design and imbibe two different ideas into a quite beautiful project which i am sure will be able to project in Near future.
Working with you set the ball rolling for me which carved a nice niche for me to think me about my Projects in Nanoparticles under Swadhin Sir and made me stick to the field even in all reactions I failed. Thank you sir, ( I know that you are not leaving the institute for fearing to pay bill for taking out for luncheon" just joking..) Hope to work under you in near future with Nanoparticles Fluorescence tagging with drosophila.

Charm Of Re-search

I had never thought I would be pursuing science as my career. I enrolled myself at Indian Institute of Science Research Kolkata as I did not wanted to go in engineering line as lot of my relatives were pursuing career in it. I wanted to do something difference, it does not mean that I had love for science. I never understood what it was? Beforehand I never realized what make scientist so different? I feared that all brainy people are scientist. But being here for now almost five semesters I have realized that scientist are not always only brainy people. Like in any field they need nevertheless the talent imbibed with hard work and luck. They have to also follow some attiquetes which are being followed by generations of scientist. you can not invent anything every time. You should be hard working and if your perseverance pays, you have a distinction.
Scientist are different from Software techies as Techies have to follow certain algorithm and make some changes in it to make it better. Techies working in the MNC's are producing anything new. What they are doing its that they are wasting their talent for handsome money. Science is never taken seriously in India as people want security, this is high risk job, not only with pay but sometimes safety. We are too lazy too follow anything. Inculcating new thing is very hard so we prefer to follow easy paths. Thus we are becoming mere puppets in hand of some MNCs'.

From last 10 months I have been assisting Shuvankar Santra, JRF under Dr. Swadhin Mondal in a chemistry project working on Palladium Nanoparticles using it as catalyst in Suzuki Reaction. We have been not able to get any positive result in the experiment. But the whole charm or feeling is like that of a child gets while playing snakes and ladders.

When we first came to IISER we had no idea what was our mission. Due to sudden transform from High School to College and also the peer pressure of new subjects we slowly become reluctant to study. The whole concept was new and we had no clue what was going on? everything was happening so fast. I was sleeping in class due to lack in interest. In the first 2 years when we were asked to submit own idea for project, I always failed to do so. Beacause I always assumed that we had read nothing new to give any idea. I thought my idea should be like that nobody had ever worked on it. At that time I had no idea of meaning of the word Research.i wanted to know what was and how was research happening in each field even I did not had idea of what the word meant. In third year I chose Chemistry as my major.

Last december Dr. Swadhin told me to go through nanoscience. It was a new goal for me to learn about it. I googled it and read " Engines of Creation" by Eric Drexler .
"Coal and diamonds, sand and computer chips, cancer and healthy tissue: throughout history, variations in the arrangement of atoms have distinguished the cheap from the cherished, the diseased from the healthy. Arranged one way, atoms make up soil, air, and water arranged another, they make up ripe strawberries. Arranged one way, they make up homes and fresh air; arranged another, they make up ash and smoke."

Eric Drexler
— Engines of Creation, p. 3, 1983

It was fantasizing experience for me it was the point I started playing snakes and ladders. I told sir that I wanted to plunge in this field. That's how I started working with Santra da. First I had experience with synthesising Gold Nanoparticles and performing Ullmann coupling with it. it was completely raw experience. Playing with nanoparticle does not meant that you have to work in vacuum chambers with space suit as we would have imagined. It was working under slenck line. I continued my work under him in summer, this time woking with palladium nanoparticles. Nanoparticles were used only to give more active sites in carbon carbon coupling reaction attributed to their large surface area to volume ratio.
We failed to synthesise Suzuki product though seldom we got Ullmann product the advantage with Suzuki product was that it was assymetric and handling phenylboronic acid was easy and mild conditions were required. While working i learnt to handle Rotavapor, Slenck line, Sonication, water line, working out in hood made my life tough at first but I knew these would come handy in coming years. These failures were like snakes. But everyday i learnt something knew whether it was from Soumyajit bhaiya telling me how to check colorless solute flowing in column or by Arup bhaiya telling me how to not waste any chemicals and use everything efficiently. Tamal Da was ready to help in tell how to do work ups.

Most important was the fact I learnt quite a bit what was research? It was not always to invent something new. most of the inventions are by serendipity. I learnt how to use Scifinder, Scopus and Sciencedirect , all these things were like ladders. How to use keywords to search something? How to read a research article?

Whole idea broke my hibernation. Now Ranjan whole was too studious and moron in school is back but this time hopefully different. It is quite showing in performance at class. I know I have quite a few goals. Yes the field of Nanochemistry excites me. But beforehand I need to have experience in core chemistry. That's my near goal which I am looking forward to do in Summer 2009.