Venkatraman Ramakrishnan
MRC Laboratory for Molecular Biology, UK

Ramakrishnan made a Nobel Prize in the sciences gain an India tag after a gap of 26 years. He shared the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2009 for helping decipher the structure of a complex biological machine that manufactures proteins inside living cells

Thanu Padmanabhan
Inter University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune

Padmanabhan has over the past eight years pencilled a revised mathematical way to describe Einstein’s theory of gravity, an effort that may call for a significant change in our ideas of gravity

Sankar Chatterjee
Texas Tech University, US

Chatterjee’s research suggests it wasn’t the asteroid that crashed in Mexico that wiped out dinosaurs. He argues a rock from space that crashed near present-day Mumbai contributed to the mass extinction event 65 million years ago

Mrigank Sur
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US

Neuroscientist Sur has demonstrated that the brain’s circuitry is a lot more plastic and adaptable than had been previously assumed. His research on the brain promises to hoist some incurable brain disorders such as autism into the realm of therapy

Raghavendra Gadagkar
Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore

Gadagkar has been observing wasps to probe some of biology’s biggest puzzles and gain insights into how biology shapes insect societies. He helped scientists understand social co-operation among worker wasps and studied queens in wasp colonies

Shrinivas Kulkarni
California Institute of Technology, US

Astronomer Kulkarni studies some exotic objects — dead, failed and exploding stars. He is now chairman of the science team of the Space Interferometry Mission, intended to be the most powerful space-based telescope yet for hunting Earth-like planets

Shubha Tole
TIFR, Mumbai

Neurobiologist Tole is trying to unravel the full genetic machinery that gives rise to the cerebral cortex, the most complex structure of the brain that is involved in all the higher functions such as language, complex thought and memory

Pulickel M. Ajayan
Rice University, US

Ajayan, who grew up in Kerala, is a nanoscale engineer tinkering with tiny materials that have potential applications in medicine and energy. Two years ago, he had helped develop an energy storage device as thin as paper. It was dubbed a paper battery

Anindita Bhadra
IISER, Calcutta

Bhadra is an example of seamless research continuity between the two decades. A student of Gadagkar, Bhadra has turned her attention to stray dogs. Her first projects are likely to focus on parental care and territoriality among street dogs