Zeroing In

Even Darwin pointed out that his ideas on categorizing species might not be the most perfect way of understanding varieties in nature. But how do you study individuals and their species individually? What is the definition of ‘boundaries’ when you move through the behavioral terrains of the nature? The answers to such questions can reveal a long history of evolution and in our third conversation o...

In the thread of our fifth season: from atoms to planets, we bead a very interesting segment of living beings. In the third episode, we converse with an extremely talented and charming Primatologist— Prof. Anindya Sinha, who is currently a professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru. Stay tuned for the complete episode coming out this weekend, wherein we converse with Prof....

How do we measure time to the utmost precision? How do we even define time? What’s the need for a definition? And where does fundamental science really matter to the everyday affairs we go through? The questions that subtly sit right beside our daily routines, and are conveniently pushed on the other side of the horizon more often than not — are the same questions that lend the modern world’s work...

From the biggest waves of the ocean to the tiniest of the atoms tick at their own frequencies. While some are extremely periodic, others shift through time. The watch on your wrist or the clock on your wall might tell you the time of the day but what do we turn to when we need to record time with extreme precision and accuracy such as in picoseconds? We turn to the atoms! Yes, atomic clocks are us...

From the biggest waves of the ocean to the tiniest of the atoms tick at their own frequencies. While some are extremely periodic, others shift through time. The watch on your wrist or the clock on your wall might tell you the time of the day but what do we turn to when we need to record time with extreme precision and accuracy such as in picoseconds? We turn to the atoms! Yes, atomic clocks are us...

In the second and final part of the conversation in the first episode of Season 5, we continue our dialogue with the distinguished physicist, Prof. Rupamanjari Ghosh. In this episode, we delve deeper into her contributions to the field of Quantum Optics, as well as her experiences as a teacher and policy maker. We talk at extent about developing the theory as well as the experimental set up for th...

How does the property of light change when we zoom in and look at the photons? When we talk about ‘Quantum’ we view the universe probabilistically, that means while you are sitting in your room listening to this excerpt there’s a teeny-tiny but non-zero chance that you are currently playing foosball with the penguins in Antarctica! Hear this exciting excerpt from a conversation where we talk about...

Quantum optics is an extremely rich and diverse field with applications ranging from super fast computers (quantum computers) to establishing a zero-failure communication system! Forming one of the most sought after fields in natural science in the present world to deepen our understanding of the universe, it holds immense potential of answering the long pressing big questions in fundamental physi...

Perhaps it is only fair to open this marveling season of our journey from Atoms to Planets with a conversation where we dive into the quantum world! When we talk about interference, we consider light as a wave, while in the photoelectric effect, Einstein very revolutionarily proposed the idea of photons as particles. Sitting right in between, begs the question — how would you explain the interfere...

While physicists go about explaining how the world works as it is being witnessed, mathematicians design a world with their own sets of curiosities. Everything being explored or has been explored about the physical system is merely a subset of the expanse to which the mathematical world extends. Delving into some fundamental yet fascinating ideas of the mathematical world, we converse with Prof. S...

Perhaps, if you take off a layer, or maybe two, from anything and everything functioning/existing in this universe, the underlying layer would be of Mathematics. Behind every pattern that ever existed to big machineries digging up holes in the ground to even the buzzing AI, everything can be written down in the language called Mathematics. It is quite fascinating to even just acknowledge the vastn...

The talks about computer science as a discipline that’s absolutely hot in trend are all pervasive. Of course, for the right reasons for most part, the field spans across the major pillars of our everyday life, and forms an inescapable basis of our present society. We deep dive with Prof. Debayan Gupta, Assistant Professor at the Ashoka University currently, on these ideas that span across a vast a...

S04 | E03: Zeroing In with Prof. Debayan Gupta | On Keeping and Working with Secrets for Scaled Societies In the information era where knowledge is vast and the possibilities are only limited to one’s imagination, Computer Science has advanced to the extent where this very write-up can be polished and generated with the help of a computer. While advanced technology can be captivating, it also brin...

The most basic of survival necessity is food—the plate at the end of the day. While the human population began settling down from the hunter-gatherer stage, it became quite essential for us to find ways of bringing our food to our vicinity. Settlement meant a big leap in the techniques of how food was grown, from calculating rains to fighting insects. There’s so much that our food depends on—from...

S04 | E03: Zeroing In with Dr. V. K. Dadhwal |  On Pertinence of Remote Sensing in Agriculture   In the upcoming episode of Zeroing In, we delve into the topic of agriculture, the foundation of human sustenance. As we settled into a more stable lifestyle, cultivating food became a necessity. However, understanding the weather patterns and pests that impact crop growth proved to be a chal...

What does it take to design, create, and settle a city? Humankind has resolved these questions in varying epochs and geographical contexts, very differently, when looked into the details of — and through all these brilliant ways of becoming, we have shaped our worlds today- in the charming cities and towns we inhabit.  Human colonies have been an intriguing subject not because the idea is new...

S04 | E02: Zeroing In with Prof. Geetam Tiwari | On City Planning and Routes to Engineering a MegaCity City life is a complex and intricate experience that we all navigate in our own ways. Our daily routines, shortcuts, and familiar routes give us a sense of familiarity and belonging in the cities we call home. In fact, that is how we sometimes substantiate our claims for having actually experienc...

Have you ever wondered how human civilsations took shape? How much do we know from our shared past, and how far do we have a scientific basis for these stories? Exploring the depths of our past and unearthing the mysteries of ancient civilizations - this is what makes archaeology such an endlessly fascinating subject. From discovering ancient artifacts and deciphering hieroglyphics, to reconstruct...

S04 | E01: Zeroing In with Prof. Kalyan Chakraborty • While building up a city, it’s quite crucial to go down a bit.  It is quite amusing to see how much a half broken eating bowl buried under ash of Pompeii can reveal stories of its citizens. But archeology isn't just about digging up dusty old relics and theorizing about the past. It's about understanding the way people lived, their beliefs...

Our everyday lives are lined by collective behaviour of all kinds of things, particles, and beings. Have you wondered if it is possible to formulate physical ideas that can lead us to understanding these fascinating behaviours that seem to appear out of sheer randomness — imagine the flocking of birds, movements of schools of fish, aggregation of bacteria, self-arrangement of bio-polymers— the hig...

How do you connect the tiniest particles of universe to macro systems — what do you find common in a bunch of strongly interacting atoms and a flock of bird?  All these systems are brought under the same hood by Condensed Matter Physics! Perhaps a seemingly complex and advanced topic for a non-field person, condensed matter physics is one of the most active fields of physics, given the divers...

“Science is like a Pandora box – It is a never ending quest”  Quoting Prof. Joshi from our conversation with him, where he simply yet elegantly points out the most fundamental idea of science – more the questions your try to answer, the more you find ‘yet to be’ answered.  Curiosity is the true nature of science and it can never walk on a single line, it demands multiple facets to pool i...

What does it take to pursue observational astronomy and how does it look like? For all these stars, and the exotic (anti)matter that lies all across our universe— how do we even muster the courage to embark on a journey that leads to deciphering these puzzles that lie far, far, far away? Listen in to the beautiful excerpt from our discussion with Prof. Bhal Chandra Joshi, an astrophysicist who dea...

The universe we inhabit is teeming with remarkable mysteries, far removed from the extraordinarily insignificant corner that the Earth occupies. Mysteries of which, we can only see the traces of, and they still, very beautifully, cradle answers to the questions of our very existence — we talk about the process of discovering these answers, and delve even more into the journey of setting out to see...

Looking up at the night sky, how do you identify the difference between all the twinkling objects above?  Among those stars are the kinds that revolve with such precision that they act as very stable clocks and give a competition to the precise atomic clocks — the Pulsars. Pulsars are rotating neutron stars which emit radiations in a wide range of spectra and observing them reveals a plethora...