IISER Bhopal: Training scientists to cross disciplinary boundaries

From classrooms to advanced labs, institute’s research provides insight for tackling climate, water and Himalayan challenges

Rattan Singh Gill

BHOPAL, Sept 15: A visit on media tour to the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Bhopal , leaves an impression that goes beyond its sprawling campus, sophisticated laboratories and impressive research facilities. What stands out is an attempt to change the way young scientists are trained — not simply to become specialists in one subject, but to look at complex problems from more than one scientific perspective.

That approach could have particular relevance for regions such as Jammu and Kashmir, where questions relating to climate change, glaciers, water resources, floods, landslides and fragile mountain ecosystems cannot be adequately addressed within the boundaries of a single discipline.

Established in 2008, IISER Bhopal has built its academic model around integrating science education with research. Its BS-MS programme, for instance, combines classroom learning with research and provides scope for multidisciplinary interaction, while its research programmes span natural sciences, engineering, data science and other areas.

The idea becomes more visible while going through its laboratories and interaction with faculty members. The institute is not merely assembling sophisticated equipment; it is attempting to create an environment in which basic science, advanced research and real-world problems can meet.

This is perhaps the more significant aspect of the IISER experiment.

Modern problems rarely respect departmental boundaries. A glacier is not only a geological phenomenon; its behaviour involves climate, atmospheric science, hydrology, remote sensing and mathematical modelling. Similarly, a water crisis may require inputs from hydrology, chemistry, environmental science, data analysis and even economics and public policy.

IISER Bhopal’s, among other disciplines, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences illustrates this approach. Its research areas include climate and glacier modelling, water-resource hydrology, climate variability, floods and droughts, river systems, remote sensing, greenhouse-gas modelling and natural hazards.

For Jammu and Kashmir, such areas are not abstract subjects confined to research papers, but needs a collaborative guidance from such an Institute.

The Union Territory’s mountain environment makes the behaviour of glaciers, changing precipitation patterns, river systems and water availability matters of direct public concern. Extreme rainfall, flash floods, landslides and other climate-linked events have repeatedly demonstrated the need for better scientific understanding of the Himalayan environment.

It is here that the interdisciplinary approach being pursued at IISER Bhopal assumes wider significance. Scientific institutions need not necessarily work on the same problems to contribute to each other’s work. The methods developed for understanding one river system, glacier or climatic phenomenon may help researchers examine another geographical region with appropriate field data and local collaboration.

Such collaborations are important because the scale and complexity of contemporary scientific questions often make isolated research increasingly difficult.

From research to intellectual property

Another indication of the institute’s research orientation is its effort to translate scientific work into intellectual property. Faculty members said IISER Bhopal has applied for around half a dozen patents, with one having been granted so far.

The numbers may appear modest, but the significance lies in the attempt to move research beyond academic publication towards innovation and possible practical application.

For an institution whose larger objective is to create a research culture among young scientists, this transition — from asking a scientific question to developing something that can potentially be protected and applied — is an important part of the learning process.

The institute’s alumni provide another measure of this research culture. According to a senior faculty member, the students are open to go for a research project from very first year, however, research project from third year is mandatory for all students undergoing the undergraduate and onward programmes.

Faculty members said IISER Bhopal alumni have gone on to some of the world’s leading universities and research institutions, either for advanced research or academic positions. The institute itself describes its objective as developing independent, scientifically minded students with critical-thinking skills and exposure to contemporary research.

That alumni trajectory may ultimately be more important than any individual laboratory or piece of equipment. Scientific institutions are judged not only by what they possess, but also by the quality of people they send into the wider scientific world.

Among those studying at IISER Bhopal are also students from Jammu and Kashmir. Their presence provides a natural link between the institute and the Union Territory, particularly at a time when J&K needs a larger pool of young people trained in modern scientific disciplines.

The absence of a longer interaction with students during the visit left one question unanswered: how does this research-oriented environment actually influence the way a young student begins to think about science?

That question, however, is partly answered by the structure of the academic programme itself. IISER Bhopal’s five-year BS-MS programme exposes students to broad areas of natural science before they move towards greater specialization and research.

The underlying philosophy appears simple: a scientist should know his or her own discipline deeply, but should not become intellectually confined by it.

India has no shortage of institutions producing graduates in individual scientific disciplines. The bigger challenge is to produce scientists capable of bringing different areas of knowledge together when confronted with problems that do not fit neatly into a syllabus.

Climate change is one such problem. Water security is another. So are Himalayan hazards, environmental degradation, sustainable agriculture and many of the technological challenges emerging from a rapidly changing world.

For Jammu and Kashmir, the relevance is immediate. Better understanding of its glaciers, rivers, groundwater, precipitation, mountain ecology and natural hazards will require scientists who can combine field observations with laboratory science, remote sensing, modelling and data analysis.

IISER Bhopal does not offer a ready-made solution to these challenges. Nor should its work be presented as such.

Its significance lies elsewhere — in demonstrating how a scientific institution can create an ecosystem where disciplines interact, research begins early and students are encouraged to approach questions rather than merely subjects.

The sprawling campus and sophisticated laboratories may be the most visible aspects of the institute. But its less visible contribution could prove more enduring: training a generation of scientists who are comfortable crossing the boundaries between disciplines.

For a country confronting increasingly interconnected scientific and environmental challenges, that could be as important as any individual discovery.