The human brain is the interpreter of our senses, controller of movement and in fact responsible for all we embrace as civilization. It consists of about 100 billion nerve cells which are interconnected through a million billion connections measuring up to 3.2 million kilometer of wiring. This wiring is essential for performing the simplest to the most complex tasks. In the last two decades the field of neuroscience has witnessed an explosion of knowledge. The stage is set for a more thorough understanding of the brain and for translating this knowledge into strategies to protect the brain from the vagaries of nature, both genetic and environmental. In order to achieve this goal, neuroscience research has accommodated multidisciplinary methods integrating the many levels of functional organization of the brain, from molecules to neurons to networks to systems and behavior.
Apart from the interest in understanding how the brain performs cognitive functions and finding links between behaviour, brain and mind, there are serious health related issues. Brain-related disorders affect large sections of population and contribute up to one-third of the total disease burden in both developing and developed nations. From birth to old age, a host of neurological and mental illnesses afflict mankind. Most of these are poorly understood and treatments are palliative rather than curative. Through the study of the normal brain and its disorders, brain research can help development of children, enrich adult life, and help us age gracefully.
Dr. Vijayalakshmi Ravindranath is the chairperson of Centre for Neuroscience, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. She obtained her Ph.D from the University of Mysore in 1981. In 1986, after completing her Post-Doctoral training at the NCI, NIH, USA, she joined the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, (NIMHANS), Bangalore. In 2000, as founder director, she helped establish the National Brain Research Centre (NBRC), an autonomous institution funded by Government of India as an institute of excellence and apex coordination centre for brain research that co-ordinates and networks neuroscience research groups in the country. She continued as the Director, NBRC till April 2009, when she returned to the Indian Institute of Science.
The unifying goal of her laboratory is to understand pathogenic mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative disorders with a goal to discover disease-modifying therapies from traditional knowledge base. She is an elected Fellow of all the 3 science academies in India, namely Indian National Science Academy, Indian Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Sciences. She is also a Fellow of the National Academy of Medical Sciences, India, Indian Academy of Neurosciences and Third World Academy of Sciences. She is a recipient of the prestigious S.S. Bhatnagar award (1996), Omprakash Bhasin Award (2001), the J.C. Bose National Fellowship (2006) and Padma Shri (2010).
TK Padmanabha is the Chief Technology Officer for Wipro Infotech, India and Middle East. In this role, he is responsible for new technology business incubation across different vertical markets. The focus is to build a strong team to drive business in Public and Private Cloud, Enterprise Mobility, Smart Utility and Homeland Security. This would contribute a large part of Wipro's revenue in the future. He will also be responsible for providing strong technology leadership across the different business units (applications, IT infrastructure, services and consulting).
Prior to this role, TKP was the Head of Systems Integration business where he headed a team of 800 consultants and specialists in the IT infrastructure Integration business with P & L responsibility. He drove the Middle East business to contribute more than 30% of the overall business with higher gross margins. TKP has been with Wipro for over 20 years and has held diverse roles like heading the Networking Practice in Systems Integration when he grew the business by more than 40% CAGR. Prior to this, he was responsible for starting the ASEAN operations for Wipro in Singapore.
