Latest news with #AzimPremjiUniversity
Scientific American
05-08-2025
- Science
- Scientific American
Terracotta Is a 3,000-Year-Old Solution to Fighting Extreme Heat
A little over 20 percent of India's households own an air conditioner or cooler, and fewer than a third have refrigerators—leaving hundreds of millions of people to face rising temperatures without artificial cooling. Extreme heat is estimated to have claimed more than 700 lives in India in 2024, its hottest year on record, and researchers warn that 76 percent of the population faces high to very high heat risk. But an innovation that's at least 3,000 years old—terracotta—is emerging as a low-cost, low-energy alternative. Once used by the Bronze Age Harappan civilization to store water, this clay-based ceramic still stands on the shelves of rural Indian homes as earthen pots that cool water without electricity and cost as little as a dollar each. 'Terracotta's porous surface allows water to slowly evaporate, carrying heat away and cooling the space around it,' says Adithya Pradyumna, an environmental health researcher at Azim Premji University in Bengaluru. Drawing on this principle, architects in India's sprawling metro areas are turning to terracotta for new passive cooling solutions that range from clay refrigerators to perforated tiles, ventilated screens, and facades that allow natural ventilation and help heat and moisture transfer between indoor and outdoor environments. In certain designs, water is also distributed across terracotta surfaces to evaporate and thus lower surrounding temperatures. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. Passive cooling uses building design to regulate indoor temperatures with natural materials, strategic ventilation and well-controlled shading. This approach works particularly well in the Mediterranean and other arid or semiarid places— like parts of the Pacific Northwest, where research found it can reduce air-conditioning loads by up to 70 percent. A pioneer in this field is Delhi-based design company Ant Studio, whose CoolAnt project uses terracotta as a second skin on concrete buildings. 'We've harnessed its hydrophilic properties and observed average temperature drops of six to eight degrees Celsius across more than 30 sites' in India, says studio founder Monish Siripurapu. The material should be even more effective in drier areas of the country, he adds. Even such modest temperature drops, Pradyumna says, can 'significantly help the human body cool itself more efficiently, especially indoors.' Research shows a direct correlation between rising temperatures and mortality. Another Indian company, Bengaluru-based A Threshold, is repurposing recycled terracotta into breathable facades. Meanwhile Gujarat-based MittiCool has created clay refrigerators that purportedly keep food fresh for three to five days without power—invaluable in homes without reliable electricity. 'Many of our customers can't afford to run conventional appliances, so this is a durable and affordable alternative,' says MittiCool founder Mansukhbhai Prajapati. Niyati Gupta, a senior program associate at research institute WRI India, says terracotta 'can complement existing cooling systems and reduce our dependence on the fossil-fuel-powered grid. That alone could be a game changer for both the energy and construction sectors.'
Time of India
19-07-2025
- General
- Time of India
41st anniversary of The Times of India, Bengaluru: From expansive spaces in colonial compounds to finding space in apartment corners, city's ornamental gardens have changed over time
When Priya Mascarenhas relocated to Bengaluru as a newlywed nearly five decades ago, every house, big or small, had a garden. She distinctly recalls how roses blooming in the neighbourhood would leave her spellbound during her strolls. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now 'My mother-in-law kept a lovely rose garden surrounded by a lot of flowering plants, bushes, and shrubs. For my birthday celebration, my husband surprised me with a bouquet of 200 red roses,' reminisces Priya, who has received accolades for her ornamental gardening. Back then, the city had gardeners trained by the British. 'They were very good with their hands and did a good job with the manuring and pruning,' said Priya. Priya's 150-year-old home in Richards Town now features a splendid ornamental garden spread across half an acre, offering an extensive array of heliconias, vines, water plants, roses, and shrubs, while Buddha statues add a zen vibe to the space. She particularly enjoys growing ornamental plants, with lantanas, monstera and verbenas being her most cherished varieties. An avid gardener, Priya would get plants from all over Europe and South America while setting up her garden. 'Now we have better plants available in Bengaluru,' she said. For instance, she could easily arrange fresh Dutch roses to commemorate her husband's death anniversary recently. Bengaluru's tradition of home gardens dates to the 17th century. Those gardens represented a unique fusion of British and Indian gardening practices, featuring diverse indigenous species alongside decorative foreign plants. Over the past four decades, the ornamental gardening scene has undergone a substantial transformation. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now Driven by the increasing number of plant nurseries and skilled landscape architects, the city marks a striking departure from the colonial-era British garden designs and now boasts meticulously maintained ornamental gardens that meet international benchmarks. 'There has also been a shift over time to more variegated plants. Those with pretty leaves, but no flowers, are much in demand these days. Unlike seasonal flowering plants, they look good all year, though they don't support other biodiversity such as birds and butterflies in the same way,' said Harini Nagendra, author of Nature in the City: Bengaluru in the Past, Present and Future. Most of those trimmed hedge plants are also recent additions to Bengaluru's ornamental garden scene, added Harini, who is also the director of the School of Climate Change and Sustainability at Azim Premji University. Amid the rise of multi-storey residential buildings with limited garden spaces, many are choosing to have ornamental plants, notes Radhika Srinivasan, a Bengaluru-based interior design consultant. A wide variety of plants, including Queen Victoria Agave, Petunia, Star Cactus, Tangled Heart Plant, String of Pearls and Mother-in-Law's Tongue (commonly known as Snake Plant), enhance the beauty of Bengaluru's home gardens, complemented by well-manicured lawns and stone-lined pathways. 'In the aftermath of the Covid pandemic, people have developed heightened awareness about their surroundings. Indoor and outdoor ornamental plants enhance the aesthetic appeal of residential spaces significantly,' said Radhika. Kunal Dammala, a 34-year-old software engineer at Infosys, fell in love with roses as they are easy to grow and don't require much sunlight. Kunal grows 60 varieties of roses on his 400-sq-ft terrace. 'Ornamental plants, in general, are excellent for landscaping as well,' stated Kunal, a huge fan of the foliage and flowering plants at the Kempegowda International Airport, Terminal 2. Interestingly, Harini points out that even as ornamental spaces have incorporated exotic plants, native herbs thrive in home gardens across the city. A growing trend involves setting up ready-made ornamental gardens. 'Grown-up plants that are 15-20 feet high are brought in and replanted in home gardens,' says Priya. Anyone can maintain a flourishing decorative garden, including individuals who lack gardening experience or have limited time for plant care. Online platforms such as UrbanMali provide access to expert gardening services, including setting up new gardens, upkeep, and renovation of existing ones. Individuals also frequently engage gardeners to handle essential tasks. Some, like Priya, however, prefer to do most of these tasks by themselves. When scientists join hands Bhuvana Sharma, a lead scientist at the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms Indigenisation of Diagnostics programme (CCAMP InDx), has been associated with Gandhi Krishi Vigyana Kendra (GKVK) in Hebbal for the last five years. She has done extensive studies on ornamental and indoor plants. Her research interests include developing superior quality ornamental plant seeds. 'Popular varieties include chrysanthemum, mosquitorepellent aloe vera, and various Vastu plants,' she says. GKVK maintains a seed outlet where the public can purchase quality-verified seeds, including ornamental varieties. The seed project department conducts thorough quality verification, testing germination rates and protein content. 'We are also exploring the possibility of using ornamental plants for rangoli and fabric dyeing,' says Bhuvana. There is a significant demand for Indian ornamental plant resources internationally and GKVK supplies seeds to many countries, including Dubai, Sweden, Japan, and Australia. Discussions are under way regarding a potential collaboration with Maastricht University in the Netherlands, Bhuvana told TOI. Harini advocates planting trees in urban public spaces rather than creating ornamental gardens and prefers trees that require less water, making them a more environmentally sustainable choice for city landscapes. 'Ornamental gardens require significant quantities of water. Scarce groundwater, often delivered through water tankers, are used to water them. Additionally, pesticides are widely used in ornamental gardens, making them environmentally unsustainable,' Harini explained. Home gardeners, however, are increasingly opting for organic manure and insecticides. Many use harvested rainwater to nurture their plants. Odette Katrak, an environmentalist and passionate gardener, follows sustainable gardening practices. 'I've six mini gardens. I water my plants with recycled water used for washing vegetables, fruit, pulses and rice. The gardens thrive on homemade compost, while I protect the plants using a natural pesticide solution prepared by mixing crushed garlic and chilli with water,' she opined. Odette, who lives in an apartment, delights in the fragrance of her blooms while experiencing a connection with the natural world.
The Wire
04-07-2025
- Politics
- The Wire
Where Is Najeeb? Why Don't You Care?
Where is Najeeb Ahmed? When a student goes missing; you don't care. You don't set up a search party, you don't comment, you don't cry about it with your 56-inch wide chest and 5,600-word long speeches, you don't write a tweet, you don't discuss it in your big board rooms with people in power, you let people think that Najeeb Ahmed is a nobody; as if he never existed, as if he should never exist at all in the order of affairs. You don't call out the students who think like you, who beat students who don't think like you – with sticks and bottles and everything blunt and sharp. You don't say anything when a library is attacked. When book shelves fall on the heads of the students. When their head bleeds from the attacks on their minds which still await to be nourished and put to good use for the country; they might be preparing for their UPSC exams but now they cannot see clearly and have bruises all over their body and mind. You don't care when your police hit the students with lathis leaving them paralysed, blind in one eye and prone to asthma and respiratory illnesses. You don't care when they are dragged into police cars and shoved into buses as they can't breathe to save the trees which they are fighting for, to have a breathable future. You don't care when they fire burning gas at young bodies, crippling them for weeks until they never walk again and get out of the house to protest, to sit on the doors of justice asking to release their fellow comrades. You do this because you know you can do this; to weaken them; you do this to break their soul by breaking their bodies, one body at a time – one student at a time; one teacher at a time by raiding their houses, compromising their computers, by destroying their bookshelves and confiscating them as evidence. Evidence of their intellectual rigour, their passion, their love for humanity, their literature and their music. You take it all and use it against them. You don't care when they shoot writers, journalists and arrest English teachers who die in your jail cells waiting to meet their mothers at their funerals. We know you don't care and you never will. But somebody has to care – so that it is not their student or friend who disappears one day. Or they themselves. Where is Najeeb Ahmed? Sarah Talat teaches English at Azim Premji University, Bangalore. The ideas in her writing only reflect her own and not those of the University.
Time of India
25-06-2025
- General
- Time of India
Rampant waste dumping choking creeks: Report
Surat: A report on the frequent flooding of creeks, released by a citizens' group and environmental NGOs, has identified rampant urban development and the dumping of waste into these water bodies as the main reasons for this annual monsoon problem. The report highlighted that natural water pathways, particularly creeks that once absorbed and dispersed excess water, are blocked due to construction activities and land-level modifications. On June 18, "Mara Surat Ni Surat - Citizen Report" was released by Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti and People's Union for Civil Liberties. The report was prepared by a team consisting of Avadhut Atre and Buddhavikas Athawale, both students of MA (Development) at Azim Premji University, Bengaluru, Krishnakant Chauhan, advocate, and Sugeet Pathakji, architect. "In many areas, the land has been raised or construction carried out right along the natural water channels. Earlier, when creeks overflowed, the water had space to spread. Now, those outlets are blocked," the report noted. The citizen-led survey also flagged several sites where solid waste is being dumped directly into creek beds, further obstructing water flow. "Despite being fully aware that overflowing creeks cause floods, Surat Municipal Corporation continues to dump waste or permits dumping in these water bodies," said Chauhan. "Every year, this mismanagement leads to massive public expenditure on post-flood sanitation and healthcare. " The team recommended immediate measures such as identifying and reopening blocked rivulets and creating new drainage channels to allow floodwater to naturally flow into nearby rivers, creeks, or the sea. "A structured survey must be conducted during and right after flooding to gather data—photos, videos, water levels, and rainfall patterns. This evidence can help plan better for the following year, and the process must involve experts and citizens alike," Chauhan added. Another member, Pathakji, emphasised the need to remove encroachments and structures that have narrowed or obstructed the creeks. "Cities like London and Seoul have restored their creeks by clearing obstructions. Surat needs to take a similar approach. Some of the current constructions are also preventing stormwater from city areas from reaching the creeks."
Straits Times
15-06-2025
- Science
- Straits Times
AI misuse in Indian colleges and how professors are arresting the situation
Even as most Indian universities forbid using generative AI for assignments, students are drawn to the time-saving, modern tool. PHOTO: JAMIE KELTER DAVIS/NYTIMES AI misuse in Indian colleges and how professors are arresting the situation - When creative writing professor Pranav V.S. in Bengaluru congratulated his student over text about a cultural performance, he received a reply that began with : 'You can express your gratitude with a simple note or message. Here's a suggestion: Thank you so much, Sir, for your kind words...' His heart sank. 'Can college students these days not even compose a personal thank-you message without getting help from artificial intelligence (AI) tools?' he wondered. Prof Pranav, who teaches at St Joseph's University in Bengaluru, is not alone in his despair over the use of AI by students. Even as most Indian universities forbid using generative AI for assignments, students are drawn to the time-saving, modern tool, many professors told The Straits Times. They said that students write entire essays and e-mails, as well as produce presentations, using generative AI. Instead of taking class notes and reading books and technical modules, they feed the PDFs into their favourite AI tools to generate simple summaries of three or four pages. Professors worry that students' use of AI disrupts the learning process, fosters impatience with studying and diminishes the importance of writing and reading. Prof Pranav said it also drives a wedge in interactions between teachers and students . 'It's a shortcut for students. But for teachers, it's more laborious to separate the AI content from the students' content. The joy of teaching is gone,' said Dr Adil Hossain , who teaches history and sociology in Azim Premji University in Bengaluru. Independent thinking is vanishing Assistant Professor Ananya Mukherjee from Azim Premji University in Bhopal, who has been teaching biology for nine years, shared that despite her picking controversial topics like genetics and reproductive choice to encourage her students to express their genuine opinions, many students use AI tools ChatGPT and Gemini to come up with talking points for class discussions. 'Independent thinking, which is the whole point of science, is getting lost,' she said. Assistant Professor Prem Sagar, who teaches computer applications at St Joseph's University in Bengaluru, told ST that he often faces the challenge of balancing his efforts between teaching his technical students how to build and train AI models for the future and discouraging their misuse in the present. 'AI is good at debugging errors and completing code, but when students depend on it entirely, their logical reasoning – which is what programming is all about – takes a hit,' he said. Still, students defend their use of AI as natural and inevitable. 'What's wrong with using an efficient way to learn?' asked computer engineering graduate Tejas P.V., 22. 'AI saves time. It helps us research by locating references. For lengthy, boring 120-page documents that professors assign us, AI helps to identify the crucial 30 pages for us to focus on,' he added. But while Mr Tejas said he used AI largely for research and expanding his 'own short points into full sentences', he admitted that he, too, has generated 'entire AI essays in high-credit subjects' that he felt were 'not important'. Ms Keerthana S., 21, who is pursuing a bachelor's degree in environmental science in a Bengaluru college, said that 'ChatGPT is always a temptation', especially when deadlines are close. In a group project to calculate the carbon footprint of shops within the college neighbourhood – a hyperlocal assignment her teacher had clearly crafted to force the students to avoid AI tools – Ms Keerthana attempted to use ChatGPT to generate what she called 'a cool introduction'. 'But the language was so technical, jargon-filled and so unlike my writing that I decided to write the introduction myself,' she said, adding that generative AI's high energy consumption also gives her second thoughts. According to some estimates, interactions with AI tools such as ChatGPT could consume 10 times more electricity than a standard Google search. Another engineering student said that he often uses AI tools to complete his programming code because, as he explained, 'even after I get a job, my bosses are not going to expect me to waste time on manually doing these basic things.' According to English professor Greeshma Mohan, students use AI because of insecurities that their own writing and ideas are not good enough, and because AI 'sounds fancier'. Teaching in an English-medium college in the small town of Bhopal in central India, where many students come from Hindi-medium schools, Prof Mohan said she empathised with their anxiety. However, she is worried that 'if they didn't experiment without the use of AI and get things wrong', they would never learn. Even after she welcomed fragmented sentences and inconsistent tenses as long as it was the students' own work, students were 'already too dependent on AI to stop using it'. 'How can I help a student whose mistakes I never see? Then what am I doing here as a teacher?' she asked. See if you can penalise me for using AI The fear of repercussions is often the sole deterrent to students against using AI, said many teachers. Most major Indian universities require every instance of AI misuse to be reported , but as the scope of generative AI is still evolving, professors are also granted the flexibility to determine appropriate disciplinary measures. Some faculties are strict and will fail a student. Some ban all gadgets in class, and assign only handwritten essays. Others permit grammar corrections or AI-assisted research, while some require students to rewrite their essay multiple times until it is completely AI-free. While most Indian universities use plagiarism trackers, and detecting AI use is now a function of software like Turnitin and the Indian-developed tracker DrillBit, they are not foolproof. In November 2024, law student Kaustubh Shakkarwar sued O.P. Jindal Global University in northern India's Haryana state over being failed for allegedly using AI-generated content in an assignment on law and justice in the globalising world . Claiming that he had done all the research himself, the student questioned the accuracy of the university's Turnitin plagiarism detection software, also powered by AI, and said it had a history of generating false positives. The university finally issued Mr Shakkarwar a new academic transcript and revised its decision to fail him. A practising lawyer today, he is ready to offer pro bono representation to 'any student who wants to sue their college over AI use'. However, many professors said they have often detected AI use, even in cases where detection software had not. Common indicators included the use of em dashes, sentences beginning with 'that being said' and 'all things considered', and essays with a balance of opinions that seemed, well, artificial. Some students also use humanising software like BypassGPT , WriteHuman and QuillBot to make AI-generated text read naturally and human-like, but many Indian students told ST that the best services were not affordable. Most of all, teachers said they could tell if AI was used because they knew their students. 'All of a sudden, a student writes fascinating prose. Who are they kidding?' asked Bengaluru-based AMC Engineering College Professor Pallavi K.V., who now conducts oral quizzes on the students' own written assignments to determine if they have even read their AI-generated work before submission. Indian professors are now devising assignments and pedagogical innovations to subvert the use of AI. One anthropology lecturer asks for audio recordings of field interviews; a law professor crafts simulation exercises inspired by landmark cases; many others set live handwritten exams that students hate because they struggle to write longhand. Dr Swathi Shivanand, who teaches historiography at the Manipal Academy of Higher Education in Bengaluru, said: 'I suppose I have more failures than successes (at weeding out AI use).' An effective assignment she devised involved asking students to imagine a dialogue between two historical figures. Professors suggested that the key to escaping AI is to make assignments as personal and imaginative as possible. In Prof Pranav's writing class, during a workshop session on horror stories, including those written by AI, the standout piece was an original story set in the college with characters named after some of the students. Ms Keerthana recalled 'a brilliant assignment' – one that few classmates used AI for – in her environmental impact assessment class, where a teacher asked them to map all the processes and components that went into making a sewing needle. Optimal use of AI Recognising the use of AI as inevitable, some professors are upskilling themselves to stay a few steps ahead of their students. For instance, Assistant Professor Arpitha Jain, who teaches English at St Joseph's University in Bengaluru, said she gave her students printed copies of prescribed non-fiction readings. But, turning the tables, she used ChatGPT to generate multiple-choice questions for them to answer. 'They hated me for it, but, later, some of them applied this method (of generating short questions from long texts) to study other subjects closely,' she said. Prof Sagar now trains other faculty in his university to use AI not just to build presentations and create lesson plans, but also to evaluate students and give more granular feedback, using data analytic tools that can notice patterns of performance and what modules someone is weak in. Prof Pallavi, concerned that her students were unable to tell when AI content was 'wrong, biased, hallucinating or actually harmful', said she now advocates responsible, conscious use of AI. When job recruiters used data-driven AI models for resume scanning, she showed how the technology's inherent sexist and racial biases resulted in a higher selection rate for men over women for software developer roles. Using the example of the viral Ghibli image trend, she also warned her students about uploading their photos for a moment of fun without realising how they may be putting their personal data at risk. Dr Rahul Dass, a former journalist who now teaches at Mahindra University in Hyderabad, recently asked his class to give five different prompts to ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot to generate an article about a major fire breaking out in a city. 'The AI outputs all described the fire, but none of the articles began with the number of people dead and injured, as a journalist would have. I want students to understand these kinds of gaps in using generative AI,' he said. Rohini Mohan is The Straits Times' India Correspondent based in Bengaluru. She covers politics, business and human rights in the South Asian region. Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
