INFOSYS PRIZE 2015 INFOSYS SCIENCE FOUNDATION “The constant happiness is curiosity.” – Alice Munro THE INFOSYS SCIENCE FOUNDATION SECURING INDIA'S SCIENTIFIC FUTURE The Infosys Science Foundation is a not-for-profit trust set up in 2009. It confers the Infosys Prize to honor outstanding achievements across six categories of research : Engineering and Computer Science, Humanities, Life Sciences, Mathematical Sciences, Physical Sciences and Social Sciences. A jury comprising eminent leaders in each of these fields evaluates the achievements of nominees against the standards of international research, placing the winners on par with the finest researchers in the world. The prize consists of a gold medal, a citation and a purse of ` 65 lakh. In keeping with its mission of spreading the culture of science, the Foundation has instituted the Infosys Science Foundation Lectures – a series of public talks, mostly by jurors and laureates of the Infosys Prize. These talks and interactions aim to inspire young researchers and students by igniting their curiosity and opening up a world of possibilities. In 2014, the Foundation also piloted Gnanadeepa, a training program for school teachers from rural Karnataka, to improve the delivery of concepts in science and mathematics. ENGINEERING AND COMPUTER SCIENCE UMESH WAGHMARE Professor, Theoretical Sciences Unit, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bengaluru Prof. Umesh Waghmare is currently Professor in the Theoretical He joined the faculty of JNCASR in 2000, and became a Full Professor Sciences Unit of Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific in 2009. His national honors and awards include fellowship of the Research (JNCASR), Bengaluru. He completed his B.Tech. in three science academies of India, Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize, Engineering Physics from IIT-Bombay in 1990 and obtained B M Birla Science Prize, J. C. Bose National Fellowship, and the his doctorate in Applied Physics in 1996 from Yale University, Materials Society of India Medal, among others. New Haven, USA. He did his postdoctoral research in Harvard University (1996–2000). The Infosys Prize in Engineering and Computer Science is awarded to Prof. Umesh Waghmare for his innovative use of first- principles theories and modeling in insightful investigations of microscopic mechanisms responsible for specific properties of specific materials such as topological insulators, ferroelectrics, multiferroics and 2-dimensional materials like graphene. His work has high potential impact in technological applications of these industrially important materials. ABOUT WAGHMARE’S WORK AND ITS IMPACT approach that starts at electronic scales, and used quantum or statistical mechanical analysis of these models to predict material Prof. Waghmare has provided a much needed bridging between the behavior as a function of temperature and other external fields, microscopic details of a material and its properties at various length while also assessing their potential for use in engineered devices. and time scales by using systematic hierarchical modeling strategies, especially for topological insulators, smart multi-functional materials CITATION BY THE JURY and nano-materials. Prof. Waghmare has made original contributions to fundamental He has been able to complement experimental studies of materials physics of materials besides providing deep insights into the by providing unbiased information at the length-scales smaller than electronic and magnetic behavior of novel materials. a few nanometers, which is hard to access experimentally, and design new materials from first-principles. In topological insulators, he resolved a puzzling observation of an unusual Raman anomaly at a pressure induced transition in r-Sb Se , The range of materials that he has worked on include topological 2 3 showing that the observed transition is from a band-insulator to a insulators, which are characterized by nontrivial topological invariants topological insulating state, with the time-scales of electrons and of its bulk electronic states; ferroelectrics, which are a class of phonons becoming comparable at the transition. smart materials that are used in micro and nano electromechanical systems; multiferroic materials, which exhibit more than one ferroic In ferroelectrics, Waghmare showed that spatial fluctuations in order parameter and are useful in multifunctional devices; catalytic the order parameter are crucial to the first-order character of the oxides, which play an important role in oxidation of harmful gases; ferroelectric transition. He solved the long-standing question of dilute magnetic semi-conductors, which are useful in spintronic giant dielectric response of a ferroelectric even away from the devices and circuits; and 2-dimensional materials like graphene, and ferroelectric transition. MoS2, which have applications in electronic devices. In multiferroics, Waghmare showed how coupling of phonons with Waghmare is a rare theorist, who has demonstrated how state of spin and electric field leads to magneto-electric and magneto- the art first-principles calculations can be used on a wide range of capacitive effects. materials to develop material-specific models through a systematic “I am impressed with the way Waghmare has seamlessly transcended the boundaries of physics, chemistry and engineering of materials, and has impacted our understanding of the microscopic mechanisms responsible for the material behavior of engineering materials of importance to industry”. – Pradeep K. Khosla HUMANITIES JONARDON GANERI Global Network Professor of Philosophy, New York University, New York and Visiting Professor, Department of Philosophy, King’s College London Prof. Jonardon Ganeri holds an M.A. in Mathematics from Cambridge in the top-ranked Philosophy Department in the United States, at University. He obtained his M.Phil. in Philosophy from King’s College New York University. He is also Visiting Professor, Department of London in 1989 and a D.Phil. in Philosophy from Oxford University in Philosophy, King’s College London. He is a Fellow of the British 1994. He has taught in some of the most distinguished universities Academy. in the world. He is currently Global Network Professor of Philosophy, The Infosys Prize 2015 in Humanities is awarded to Prof. Jonardon Ganeri for his outstanding scholarship and originality in interpreting and scrutinizing analytical Indian Philosophy. He has thrown light on the shared ground as well as the dichotomy between Indian and Greek traditions of philosophical reasoning, thereby illuminating both. ABOUT GANERI’S WORK AND ITS IMPACT Prof. Ganeri’s first book Artha (or Semantic Powers) shows how to generating a new form of the human 'subject'. Though based widely the intensely brilliant theories of meaning that analytic on the Sanskrit philosophical literature, his work is deeply informed philosophers had produced in the last two or three decades of by the Islamicate and Persian context in which it emerged and the 20th century had very substantially been anticipated in the flowered. 17th century by Indian philosophers, in particular in the theoretical account they offered of singular reference—both proper names and CITATION BY THE JURY such phenomena as anaphora. This is one of the books that opened Prof. Ganeri brings to the study of Indian Philosophy both an acute up the minds of philosophers in the English-speaking world to the form of rigor derived from his training first in Mathematics and then riches of Indian Philosophy, in Analytic Philosophy, and a tremendous range of work, spanning His highly original book The Concealed Art of the Soul argues at the fields of logic, the semantics of natural language, epistemology, length and with real persuasive force that in an entire tradition of metaphysics, philosophy of psychology, ethics, and in recent years, philosophy, the communication of an idea is deeply embedded even political philosophy. in the notion and practice of reading, which can be the basis of Of the many classical philosophical traditions in the world, Indian self-transformation. In his remarkable book, The Self, Ganeri Philosophy stands shoulder to shoulder with the Greek and Chinese first removes the conventional wedge that is drawn between traditions in its richness, and Ganeri is the most productive and the Buddhist and other Indian traditions of the study of mind, by penetrating scholar and interpreter of analytical Indian Philosophy unearthing deep ambiguities in the idea of the ownership of mental today. He has explored with great skill a variety of non-classical states, and thereby expanding the concept of the self. logics and has written scholarly papers of considerable brilliance In a bold recent work, The Lost Age of Reason, Ganeri demonstrates on Jaina Logic, Informal Logic, the ‘Indian syllogism’, and the Nava that there was in the 17th century an upheaval of philosophical Nyaya logical theory. He currently holds a professorial position with thought that amounted to a form of incipient modernity in India, the title Global Network Professor of Philosophy within New York with the creation of networks of new intellectuals seeking to clarify, University. integrate, and refashion their relationship with the past, with a view “I congratulate Jonardon Ganeri for his contributions to Indian analytical philosophy, which stands shoulder to shoulder with other analytical traditions like the Greek and the Chinese. But they have often been neglected, partly because of an excessive focus on