TCS ILP Training Centre at HIT

TCS has chosen Haldia Institute of Technology as one of its ILP training centre. This centre can accomodate around 700 TCS Trainee Associates.

8 faculties from CSE, MCA, and IT department of HIT has been inducted as ILP trainer till now.

We have to teach Basic Programming Concepts using Dr Scheme programming language, Structured Modelling, OOP concept using Dr Java, OOP implementation. We started taking classes from 31 December.

For these sessions, I had to give so much time for good preparation. Though overall, I am enjoying much these sessions due to the good quality associates (or students !). Only today I got some time to breath - and so I am writing this blog !

TCS Guwahati is mentoring this centre. They took our telephonic interview before inducting us as trainee. Most of the associates are from Tamil Nadu. I am taking sessions for 2 batches. Most of these associates in these 2 batches are from Biotech background. But they are picking up the subject very nicely.

Indocrypt 2009

Indocrypt 2009 was held in Indian National Science Academy (INSA) New Delhi, jointly organised by SAG DRDo and Delhi University, from December 13 to 16. Also attended last years Indocrypt 2008 at IIT Kharagpur.
I met there Kishan-da, Subhamoy-da, Rana-da, Bimal-da, Sanjit-da, Avishek, Prem-da, Sumanta others. Kishan-da gave me so much time. I stayed in RAC guest house in Timarpur, near Delhi University campus.
First day was tutorial sessions given by Nicholas Sendrier and Willi Meier. Remaining days were filled with paper presentations and invited talks.
Next year Indocrypt will be held in C R Rao Institute of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science in University of Hyderabad campus, Workshop will be held in PSG college of technolgy Coimbatore, and workshop on teaching cryptography at undergraduate level will be held in Manipur University.

I couldn't see see the tourist places in Delhi due to lack of partner. Kishan-da and others was staying in Aurobinda Ashram. Only places I have seen while going to conference venue by bus are Red Fort, Raj Ghat, Shakti Punj (some thing like that), and Chandni Chowk Market. One day I went to Red Fort in the evening but by that time it was closed. Also due to lack of time I coudn't go to Modinagar, Merut to meet OP and Parmanand, my friends of NIT Rourkela.

During this period, the cold was not severe. The foods in the conference was just excellent. The conference dinner was held in India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road.

Happenning Medinipur

Last week I attended Subhasish's elder brother's marriage ceremony in Medinipur. Earlier I went Medinipur quite a few times when I took admission in Chemistrty Hons in Midnapur College or for Practical Exams or deputation to the VC for openning M.Sc during the final years of graduation in Computer Science from Panskura College. Compare to those days, I was quite impressed to see the development in the stretch from Midnapur Rail Station to Keranitola. Possibly, the setting up of Jindal's Steel Company has boosted up the economy of the quite old Medinipur town.

Met our M.Tech junior Sourav in the wedding reception. Had a good discussion with him regarding his dissertation, his upcoming book to be released in the kolkata book fair.

Papers in the Coming Semester

The subjects, I'll be teaching in the coming semester to the HIT students are as follows:

1. Network Security,

2. System Software and Administration , and

3. Formal Language and Automata Theory.

Many are considering these are bit loaded. Lets see. I am happy to get the paper Network Security as this subject is close to my area of work. The Administration part of SSA paper is new to me... taking help from Google Books... hopefull, i will be able to justify students expectation...

One Update: I'll not be taking Automata, though I was interested to take it.

Packed Novemeber

The month of November was of little bit pressure. I Had to finish the syllabus of Microprocessor & Microcontroller. Apart from my own slots, I had to take slots of another faculty who had already finished her syllabi to complete my portion. Lets see how my students would perform in the university exam...

There were setting the question papers, invigilation for second class test, correcting the answer scripts, different meetings etc..

Few Online Research Magazine

We can surf the following sites to get the feeling of progress/overall scenario in the science community -
Scientific American Magazine: http://www.scientificamerican.com/sciammag/
Resonance Journal of Science Education: http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/
Current Science Journal of Research: http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/
Royal Society Science News : http://royalsociety.org/page.asp?id=8471

Nobel laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan

Royal Swedishs Academy of Sciences has given the following as press release in their website http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2009/press.html
"The Royal Swedish Adademy of Scienceshas decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2009 jointly to
Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge,United Kingdom
Thomas A. Steitz, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
Ada E. Yonath, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
"for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome"

The Ribosome translates the DNA code into life
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2009 awards studies of one of life's core processes: the ribosome's translation of DNA information into life. Ribosomes produce proteins, which in turn control the chemistry in all living organisms. As ribosomes are crucial to life, they are also a major target for new antibiotics.
This year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry awards Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A. Steitz and Ada E. Yonath for having showed what the ribosome looks like and how it functions at the atomic level. All three have used a method called X-ray crystallography to map the position for each and every one of the hundreds of thousands of atoms that make up the ribosome.
Inside every cell in all organisms, there are DNA molecules. They contain the blueprints for how a human being, a plant or a bacterium, looks and functions. But the DNA molecule is passive. If there was nothing else, there would be no life.
The blueprints become transformed into living matter through the work of ribosomes. Based upon the information in DNA, ribosomes make proteins: oxygen-transporting haemoglobin, antibodies of the immune system, hormones such as insulin, the collagen of the skin, or enzymes that break down sugar. There are tens of thousands of proteins in the body and they all have different forms and functions. They build and control life at the chemical level.
An understanding of the ribosome's innermost workings is important for a scientific understanding of life. This knowledge can be put to a practical and immediate use; many of today's antibiotics cure various diseases by blocking the function of bacterial ribosomes. Without functional ribosomes, bacteria cannot survive. This is why ribosomes are such an important target for new antibiotics.
This year's three Laureates have all generated 3D models that show how different antibiotics bind to the ribosome. These models are now used by scientists in order to develop new antibiotics, directly assisting the saving of lives and decreasing humanity's suffering."

What Dr. Ramakrishnan says about the reason why he changed his area of work: “Well, I’ll be honest with you. I was a theoretical physicist but my PhD work was on a problem that was not particularly interesting to me at the time. And I used to subscribe to Scientific American and found that there were all these wonderful discoveries happening in biology…. So, I decided to switch.” Besides his parents were peer biochemist. His parents were engaged in research in the West. In 1955, when the University of Baroda invited his father C.V. Ramakrishnan to join the MS University, Baroda in Gujarat, the couple gave up their career in north America and returned home. Together, C.V. Ramakrishnan and Rajalakshmi set up the biochemistry faculty at the University , and won global recognition for their work on the role of nutrition in brain development. Their young son was then specialising in physics and had already done his BSc. from the University of Baroda and his PhD. later from Ohio University, both in physics.
Then he joined Yale as a post-doctoral fellow in the chemistry department.