'Science is global' was a statement coined by the participants at the Royal Society along with national academies across the UK and Europe, at an event in Manchester earlier during the year, indicating the importance of the international nature of scientific research. The American Association for the Advancement of Science highlighed that the Indian budget 2016-17 had science spending in India slated to rise 11% to USD 1.19 bn. However, the possibility of any advancement in scientific research is peppered with stifling bureaucracy, poor-quality education and insufficient funding. With each successive government came pledges to increase the support to the research community, but it has remained below expectations.

A wide disparity lies in the resources available in India and in other advanced countries. Over the years, Indian scientists have learnt to adapt, make do, and get science done. By tackling its systemic problems, India can compete with other emerging research powerhouses such as the US and China. India is already at an enviable position in the global pharmaceutical market, positioned as a manufacturer of economical, high-quality bulk drugs and formulations. Stakeholders in the industry will convince you that India is well on its way to become a scientific powerhouse. And truly so since the government has already initiated multi-billion Dollar investments to boost research, education, and innovation advancement over the next five years. Though several challenging issues remain for the country, India's best talent is being enticed back to Mother India with the promise of world-class research infrastructure and solid funding.

ET this month looks at Scientific Research In India.

In the Thinking Aloud segment, Jay is convinced that India is well on its way to develop a scientific eco-system in the pursuit of excellence in this realm, backed by the participation of both the public and private sectors, the setting of world class infrastructure development and other steps.

On the Podium, we speak to Dr. S. Ramaswamy, Senior Professor and Dean at the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. He highlights that India's basic sciences sector has not kept pace with applied research due to the various challenges that impact this segment, and offers constructive steps to overcome these.

In the We Recommend section, Senior Manager - HR, at Crown Worldwide, Mukesh Mane reviews Chris Bailey's book - The Productivity Project, which has insights of over 25 best practices that will help readers to be productive in all spectrums of life. The author began researching productivity and conducting experiments of every kind for a year and the result - his book on productivity.

In the Standing Ovation section, we feature Ahmedabad based Shatayu, an NGO aimed to create awareness on the importance of organ donations and the willingness to gift a new lease of life to fellow beings.

In Figures of Speech, Vikram offers his perspective on the 'magic' of biological research!

As we come to the end of another exciting year, team ELS would like to wish our patrons a Happy New Year!

As always, we value your opinion, so do let us know how you liked this issue. To visit our previous issues you can visit the Resources section on the website or simply Click Here. You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn & Google+ - where you can join our community to continue the dialogue with us!

Does STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) education get enough attention in India? This seems a strange question to ask in a country where parents are obsessed with sending their children to cram schools to prepare their young ones for engineering and medical college examinations. However, this has been a concern in policy making circles for a while as the question does arise whether Pure Sciences (as contrasted with Information Technology) gets sufficient prominence in the new consumerist & materialistic Indian society that India has become.

According to the Indian National Science Academy, science education in the country has suffered due to its chequered history. In its much referenced book, 'Pursuit & Promotion of Science: The Indian Experience', it traces Indian science education to its early period when the ancient University of Taxila in the 6th century BC attracted scholars in varied fields, including mathematics, astronomy, medicine, surgery and metallurgy. Sadly, this spirit of free enquiry was lost in the medieval period only to be followed by resurgence in patches under the new & alien language of English when provincial Universities were created in the 19th century. Under regulated conditions only those developments were permitted which did not go contrary to the colonial interests as education was tailored to producing clerks for the civil system or at best teachers to serve the administrative interests. Consequently, not much scientific enquiry could be expected under this regime. Despite this adverse environment, the genius of a few scientists did shine through the haze: notably men like C. V. Raman, M. N. Saha, S. N. Bose, S. Ramanujan, S. Chandrashekhar, to name a few, who largely worked in Indian universities.

'The temples of modern India', to paraphrase the visionary leader of free India, Jawaharlal Nehru, slowly came into being, with the Prime Minister providing the thrust for science and technology. Backed by the exhortations of eminent scientific minds like Homi Bhabha, the father of India's atomic energy programme, ('What developed countries have and what developing countries lack is modern science and an economy based on modern technology. The problem of developing countries is therefore the problem of establishing modern science and transforming their stagnant and traditional economy to the one based on modern science and technology.'), the government did take steps to foster science. But as in many other aspects, sustaining the early interest with deeper commitment has been a challenge.

But there is some recent good news to console us! According to a well-reported recent study by Elsevier, a globally respected publication, as against the global average growth of 4.1%, the volume of scientific publications from India has risen by 13.9%.

Before we start becoming complacent at this data, the following table presents some stark numbers which serve as a healthy reminder of the immensity of the task before us to raise standards:

Be that as it may, the other piece of encouraging news from the same Report is that when it comes to citations, the share of Indian papers has risen to 20.8% in the share of top 1% cited papers, and likewise, its share of the top 5% cited papers has grown 15.4%, leading the Report to conclude, 'that there is growth in scientific excellence and this growth is aggressive at the top end of the excellence scale'.

Thus both quantity & quality from Indian academia show upward movement, certainly a cause for cheer. In fact, estimations are that India has risen to become the 6th largest R&D spender in 2016 (at USD 71 billion, both private & public sector investment aggregated) and will overtake South Korea & Germany by 2018. However, the sobering fact is that for the same period, the two largest spenders are the United States (at USD 514 billion) and China (at USD 396 billion)! When you keep in mind also that China's stated ambition is to be the global leader in science by 2050, the yawning gap stands as a huge wake-up call.

The message is clear, while both the government & the corporate sector should raise their investment in the scientific arena and build global infrastructure to enable the pursuit of excellence, there is also a need to increase the appeal of 'pure science' as a source of societal advancement and nation-building, thereby strengthening the sourcing base of new scientists. Part of the challenge is to make scientific education more exciting & increase its popularity among young students. In particular, there is a need to widen the attractiveness of pure science for girls. While this is a global quest (much debated every year when male Nobel prize winners vastly out-number women scientists), in the Indian context, this requires greater urgency.

Is this a feasible journey? Given the major steps that Indian science has taken in space research, bio-technology, medicine, etc., and the emergence of science-based start-ups seeded by some world class universities with the mentorship of brilliant academics, on this issue, there is optimism all round. Can more institutional support be offered to accelerate the pace of development & to create Indian Scientific Heroes? Undoubtedly, yes! That is the real task at hand before us, the non-scientists - create an atmosphere that genuinely appreciates & brings to life the words of the Nobel winner, C. V. Raman: 'There is only one solution for India's economic problems and that is science, more science and still more science'.

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Dr. S. Ramaswamy is a Senior Professor and Dean at the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine (inStem), in Bangalore, India. A PhD holder from the Indian Institute of Science, he is a Scientist, Science Administrator, Institution Builder, Consultant, Entrepreneur, Advisor, Teacher, and Enabler. With successful careers in three continents, Dr. Ramaswamy has an experience in setting up multinational collaborative research and education programs, industry-academia collaborative programs, innovation acceleration, and in creating and managing technology platforms. He strongly believes that collaboration and institutional success is the core 'value system' in science and leadership. He has also bagged the University of Iowa Research Foundation's "Inventors Award" for 2016. Currently, he also serves as the Chair of the Governing Council of the Institute for Trans-disciplinary Health Sciences, Bangalore and is a scientific Advisor and Mentor to several start-up companies, including, XCODE, Bugworks, and iBioA.

ET:  At the outset, how would you describe the current status of the biological research scene in India? In particular, what are the broad areas being researched in India?

SR:  Life Science Research in India is at an interesting point. There is an opportunity for India to break into the big league. There is a very broad area of applied work especially in the agricultural sector which has made a big difference to the Indian economy. We have had two spikes in agricultural productivity. India is a big producer and exporter of chicken. In the Pharma sector, we produce a significant amount of generics (process innovation) and are now growing to be producers of biosimilars. Investments by the government in life science research has hence yielded great returns.

However, our basic sciences have not kept pace with applied research. This has resulted in India not being a leader in creating a new biotech industry - but it has been a follower all along - a user of life science research. However, the timing is appropriate that if the right administrative investments, administrative changes, regulatory frameworks and policies are put in place, India can become a global player in biotechnology.

ET:  What are the challenges that hinder the advancement of this segment in India and how can key stakeholders overcome these?

SR:  There are a number of challenges. A few are listed here in order of what changes will have the maximum impact:

1. It is imperative that the Government invests in science. However, it is impossible to predict what research will become a product in the near future. Hence, science funding has to be relieved of "control". When the British ruled India and they needed Indian officers to run the government, they had Indian officers to feel that they run the 'departments'. The department heads had a feeling of power - they could decide a lot of things, but could not sign a cheque. The cheque was signed by a white man (who apparently was below the level of this head). This white man reported to the "exchequer" (read: Finance Ministry, in today's parlance). His goal was to save money - the less money each department spent, the more it went to the 'Crown'. He was rewarded based on how much money he did not let the department spend (yet the British tooted their horns saying how much was allocated to each department and how they are committed to welfare, education, science, etc.). The department heads hence had no real power. Unfortunately, we have replaced the white man with a Finance Ministry official. The secretaries of the science departments have to have the signature of the "financial advisor" on every expenditure. This puts the real power with the financial advisor, who reports to the Finance Ministry (this person has now replaced the white person). These people have no understanding of science and every project (after recommendation by a peer committee) gets budget cuts. Money is not released on time and this has reached a crisis point. Real progress in science can happen when peer groups decide not only what to fund but how much to fund. This requires funding decisions be decentralized.
   
   Unless the mission of science and technology development is given to domain experts, Indian science will grow at minimal pace and the motivation of Indian scientists will remain low. Sure, the Finance Ministry makes the budget allocations, however, once that is made the powers of expenditure should lie with the secretaries and Ministry of Science, rather than the Finance Ministry. Unless this happens, Indian science is only going to totter, even if they hire the best people to run the ministries. The evidence is present in our 'Space' and 'Atomic Energy missions', where autonomy was given and results are obvious. Even this autonomy is being eroded. Today, the government needs to invest in the critical areas of life sciences in 'mission mode'. The effects will then be visible 15-20 years from now. The lack of this sustained investment and administrative hurdles if removed will give a big fillip to Indian life science research. This culture of lack of autonomy then percolates down to the lowest levels.

2. There is a constant confusion between 'output' and 'outcome'. Indian science is primarily output driven. Where did you publish your paper - what is the impact factor of the journal? Did you spend the grant money in the correct 'head' to which it was allotted. How many students did you train? These are the types of questions that are used to evaluate science. These are outputs. Unfortunately, in the Indian context neither the scientists nor the science administration distinguishes the difference between output and outcome. Hence, there is a constant bias to the reward - which is the output rather than the outcome. Most research institute heads/directors spend more time worrying about audit than about scientific outcomes.

3. Leadership crisis - there is serious leadership crisis - at all levels. Indian life science has so far lacked a Homi Bhaba (for atomic energy) or a Satish Dhawan (for space) who had a direct line to the highest offices that allowed them to chaperone these programs in mission mode, yet be focused and generous in the national interest. Scientific accomplishments are confused with leadership roles and our good scientists (with their high self-interest - a critical factor to succeed in science) are often put in leadership roles, compromising both their scientific productivity as well as organizations/institutions that they lead.

4. Culture - the idea that somehow intellectual elitism is superior to the need to translate and create commercially or socially useful science is still very prevalent. This has made it very hard for Indian industries to work with Indian academic institutions. Conflict of interest is used to kill the association of academics with the Indian industry. It is almost impossible to have no conflict of interest - science leadership has to learn to 'manage' conflict of interest. This in spite of government policies that allow and encourage translation, consulting and working with industry. Unless one accepts that financial rewards for discoveries when translated into market are good - there is going to be very little motivation to do this. There will always be the exceptions - but one cannot rely on exceptions to drive the economy.

5. Inability to deal with private institutions that do research - our funding agencies (and the bureaucrats therein) cannot seem to reconcile to the fact that private universities and NGOs can do good science and it should be supported. Many of the best universities in the world are private (MIT, Harvard, Stanford, etc.) and this needs to dramatically change.

6. Obsession with "Indian". Most of the countries that have scientific ambitions (including China) hire the best scientists to do their research and allow them to flourish. They do not discriminate based on race or nationality, the ability to garner funding for the program as far as they are employed in a local institution and do their research in that country. Many of the grants (both for research and start-ups) are today only for Indian nationals. While, there is significant talk about trying to get back the lost talents (Indian origin scientists outside, who are now not Indian citizens), once they are hired they are not treated as equals even if they are "overseas citizen of India". The policy has to turn to no discrimination in the ability to get government grants for doing science or doing start-ups as far as they are done in India. This is a sure way to get the best people in the world to come and do science and do their start-ups in India.

7. The inability of practitioners to participate in science is a big bottleneck - our agricultural outreach personnel or our clinical doctors are not trained and find it difficult to also have a research career in parallel. This hinders research and needs to change to provide direction to science that is of relevance to our society.

The above changes will allow better use of even the small resources that India allocates for research and development.

ET:  Is the scientific research ecosystem in India comparable to those in the US, UK, China, Japan, etc. & what is your view on the quality of research conducted in Indian institutions, both governmental research bodies & in Industry?

ET:  Are Indian scientists burdened by the cost of research? Or, can one claim that 'frugal science' practices lead to more cost-effective innovations in India?

SR:  Indian Scientists are not burdened by the cost of research. While the overall funding level for science is low, the number of active biological research scientists is also low. I do not think there is pressure to do 'frugal science'. The funding rate in India is better than funding rates in most developed nations.

ET:  How do you view the contribution of private companies, especially start-ups, in developing & engaging in biological research in India?

SR:  Private companies in India differ a lot. In the Pharma sector, there is a significant confusion between Research and Development. Real basic research - even that is targeted towards understanding disease processes - is not done in Indian Pharma. Most work starts either with phenotypic screens or medicinal chemistry on already established targets. The CROs are set up to do state of the art work. However, they work on other people's ideas. Start-ups in life sciences is a growing enterprise in India. In the past few years, very exciting science is being done in start-ups. This has also been fuelled by grant funding from public agencies. This significantly de-risks providing undiluted funding to start-ups, allowing them to ask questions that they cannot normally ask from an angel investor or a venture capitalist. Indian life science start-ups are also working in the intersection of engineering technology, information technology and life sciences where a number of exciting new findings are beginning to happen.

ET:  What is the role of the National Centre for Biological Sciences in inculcating the spirit of research among students and research fellows in the community?

SR:  The Bangalore Life Science cluster consists of three different institutions. The oldest is the National Center for Biological Science (NCBS), which is a center of the Tata Institute Fundamental Research, Mumbai. NCBS is 25 years this year and it carries out research in a wide variety of areas in biological science. Science is driven by individual scientists and their groups. In 2009, NCBS incubated the creation of a new institute where research is done in a thematic fashion by groups of people coming together to solve problems. The Institute was funded by the Department of Biotechnology and called the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative medicine (inStem). Currently, the Institute has six themes and most of the themes are multi-national collaborations. inStem's mandate is a combination of basic research as well as translational work. inStem also has a center at the Christian Medical College at Vellore. The third institution is the Center for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP) which acts as the interface with industry and drives innovation. C-CAMP has programs that help convert discoveries that happen in research labs into innovation that is interesting to develop products. They help convert ideas to proof of concepts in collaboration with the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC). It works with several agencies that promote start-ups in life sciences and provides incubation support and mentoring by bringing in industry leaders with domain expertise along with start-ups. While the institutions were set up with different mandates, today, many people work across these three institutions seamlessly.

The Bangalore Life Science cluster is a unique experimental model, which promotes individual excellence, theme driven science, translation (discovery to innovation) and a start-up culture all in one campus. This allows students and research fellows to think broadly and contribute to society in multiple ways.

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"Every day we get 24 hours to live our lives in a meaningful way. But once you account for all the obligations each of us have, there really isn't much time left; a paltry 2½ hour for most of us, to be exact. Productivity is also the difference between having no time or energy left at the end of the day and having a ton of time and energy left over to invest however you want." This is an excerpt from Author Chris Bailey's renowned book "The Productivity Project".

In today's world, there is only 1 answer:

"Productivity is = Accomplishment"

And to manage it, you need to manage your TEA (Time-Energy-Attention). How would you manage your TEA? A good sleep consumes Time, but it frees up Energy. Spend time to remove distractions, it frees up your 'Attention.' Changing your mind-set consumes a lot of energy & focus, but it frees up Time for you to do meaningful things. So Manage your Time, Energy and Attention and you have your 'Accomplishment' i.e. Productivity.

Laying the groundwork for productivity

Productivity is not an overnight thing. You need to do some groundwork to become productive. Let us look at some myths of productivity. Myth 1: Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy-wealthy and wise? Not necessarily. Human beings are complex, everyone is 'wired' differently. Some are productive in the morning, some in the night. What matters is accomplishment. Myth 2: Can you be productive just because someone told you? No. Unless your goals are deeply connected with your psyche, no force can drive you. There is only one force, your Values - religious values, social values or professional values. Once your goals are connected to your values you deeply cherish, you are on your path to Accomplishment.

Are all tasks equal? No. At least we have a proven theory by Mr. Pareto. Yes, the 80-20 Principle. 80% achievement can come from just 20% High Impact Tasks (HITs). You only need to identify these 20%.

Our life is generally governed by the Power of 3. The power of 3 gives you a guiding light, simplifies your efforts, removes complexity and encourages innovation. Break your laundry list of 100 tasks into combination of 3s. Identity 3 compelling outcomes you want to achieve in a day/week or a month. Just ensure the 3s are not too small, not too big, just right sized. Also the 3s should be challenging enough that does not hurt your motivations levels. And you have enough TEA to deal with them.

Biological Prime Time

There are times in a day when your body is full of energy, and these time zones are called Biological Prime Time (BPT). If you schedule your 20% HITs on these time zones, the results can be magical. However, you need to spot these BPT zones for better results, and you can do so by tracking your energy fluctuations for a period of 2-3 weeks or so. These insights, if applied, can be incredible.

Procrastination

The research says that our brain is divided into two parts - the left part recognizes instant pleasures, fears, rewards and the right part deals with long complex tasks that requires planning and future actions. When the 'left' part overpowers, you tend to procrastinate. Because you do not find instant pleasure, reward or fun or just get scared then you 'Delay,' or 'Procrastinate.' When the right part overpowers, you stay committed, work hard, show dedication and attain 'Accomplishment.' To handle procrastination, add left-brain attributes to the right-brain tasks. In other words, make your longer, complex tasks more pleasurable, interesting and structured, set some rewards for yourself, and your left-brain starts helping the right-brain to achieve tasks.

End of Time Management

In these time, it is said Time Management has ended. How? Time was being tracked by using the sun's position in pre-historic days. During Industrial Revolution, productivity was Time and Time was money. Today, it is time, energy, attention, social life, fun and at the end of the day 'Accomplishment' has become money. Hence, time management has ended.

Do more with less

Today, every Manager says 'Do more with Less' but how? By working countless hours, without breaks? That would hurt your energy & attention badly. As the day passes, energy & attention depletes faster than you think. Break the tasks into small time pieces and then do them. Smaller the time, higher the energy and higher focus levels.

Cleaning the house

When you set 20% HITs and spend 80% of your time doing them, what happens to the rest of the 80% tasks you cannot do away with? Set a maintenance day and chunk them together. On the other side, when you set 80% of your time to do 20% HITs, you also need to make sure that you are not distracted by unwarranted things. To remain focused and attentive at 100% levels, one needs to remove the cobwebs of unimportant or low impact tasks. You can do that by 1) eliminating some straightway 2) shrink time spent on them severely and 3) delegate wherever possible. Sometimes it is also OK to say No to certain things. When you remove these obstacles you can truly experience a Zen-like/meditative state to immerse yourself into your 20% HITs.

Quiet your mind

Our brain is to generate ideas, solve problems, not to choke it up with mindless clutter. There are thousands of things we still carry in our heads. Unless you remove this clutter from your mind, there will be no peace, no attention and no focus. Take these things out of your head and on a piece of paper - a To-Do List. Psychologically, once you write down things, they come out of your head because there is no fear of forgetting them as they are written somewhere to refer back to. Empty your brain, Quiet your Mind!!!

We are always surrounded by the daily whirlwind of activities. However, it is important to step back, review and make course corrections and then surge ahead. A bird's eye view is crucial. Make it a ritual, preferably a weekly ritual. The most productive people 'rise-up' by doing weekly course corrections and gradually get better at everything.

Gone are the days when time was money. Today, accomplishment is money but that does not come without Creativity. Today, one needs to be smart to get things done the smarter way. Creativity originates in a free day-dreaming mind. Hence, it is important to let your mind wander at times, day dream and think of abstracts and then use your 'right-brain' to action upon ideas. Make room in your mind to do both creative thinking as well as to act upon them.

Build your Attention Muscle

So many times we are neck deep into our activities, well on our path to accomplishment, but there comes an unwarranted notification, distraction or a disturbance. Disable all these so that they do not hijack your attention. Keep distractions 20 seconds away because psychologically when it takes longer than 20 seconds to pick up something, your mind won't do it.

The most powerful technique of attention building is 'Single-Tasking.' Please note that multi-tasking is not cool; it creates errors, stress, consumes time, is boring, depressing and it affects memory. Single-Tasking is equal to mindfulness. However, you cannot spend lots of time doing just one thing. Break the tasks and time into small pieces. The Pomodoro techniques says - work for 25 minutes take a 5 minute break. Do this for 3-4 times, then increase the break to 10 minutes and then to 15 minutes. For example, in the sunlight, if you focus a magnifying glass on a piece of paper for a few seconds, the paper starts burning. That's the power of Focus - killing the tasks faster and better and with no ash left.

Taking Productivity to next level

Refueling is as important as doing things in a focused manner. There are no substitutes to real food, water and physical fitness to generate and maintain energy levels. Real food cannot be substituted with processed fast food. Unprocessed natural food gives a steady drip of energy throughout the day. Exercise & body fitness helps to maintain blood flow, mental strength and fights fatigue & stress. Hence, eat-drink-sleep enough to ensure that you are refueled and energized.

Finally, it is said that happier minds are 31% more productive. Good breaks in between keep you steadily energetic & attentive. Write down at least 1 positive thing that happened to you in a day. Reflect to check if you are getting closer to your goal each day. Also, reward yourself for the hard work and/or achievement and make a list of your accomplishments.

Bailey turned down lucrative job offers to pursue a lifelong dream into the pursuit of productivity, a subject he had enamored with since he was a teenager. After obtaining his business degree, he created a blog to chronicle a year-long series of productivity experiments he conducted on himself. While some of the tactics in this book are on the easier side, most of them take more time, attention and energy.

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Shatayu is an NGO and an initiative by the Govindbhai C. Patel Foundation, which is supported by Ganesh Housing Corporation Limited. Its main aim is to increase awareness about organ donation in India, and broaden the mind-set of people towards the gift of life. Founded in the year 2009, the low rate of organ donations in the country had inspired this NGO to try their best to educate people about this cause.

Today, Gujarat is one of the leading states in India in organ donations. The NGO has been successful in spreading the importance of pledging organs for donation after death. They have been able to help with several organ donations and transplants. While eye donations continue to happen on a regular basis, they have also been involved in kidney, liver, heart transplants and in entire body donations. Apart from this, Shatayu entered the Limca Book of Records for organizing the largest motorbike rally in the country to create awareness and has also published India's first comic book on donating organs.

Over time, Shatayu has built effective, long term relationships with hospitals, where organ and tissue donation opportunities occur through the Hospital Contact Program. Working with hospital administrators, nursing staff, physicians and transplant surgeons, Shatayu's team conducts awareness talks and promotes organ donations by putting up posters and brochures in hospitals as well as by educating the nursing and the ICU staff. Further, their training workshops for Transplant Coordinators have helped to train and enable nurses and the ICU staff to effectively counsel grief stricken families of brain dead patients. Shatayu's team has also been successful in bringing together various hospitals to come forward and participate in their organ donation awareness program.

Please visit their official website http://www.shatayu.org.in/, for more information.

For their efforts in creating awareness for donating organs, Shatayu deserves a Standing Ovation!

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