NCL-TEC Students visit Praj Matrix

18 members from NCL-TEC visited Praj Matrix Innovation Center located in Pirangut, near Pune on 4^th Jan 2011. They spent about three hours in Praj Matrix, which is a R&D center dealing in bio and environmentally sustainable solutions. This was part of the industry visits organized by NCL-TEC.

More information on Praj Matrix: http://www.praj.net/matrix_innovation.asp

The students met with senior scientists at Praj Matrix and were given a short presentation about Praj Matrix and its research activities. Then the students were divided into two groups, and both the groups visited the highly advanced labs at Praj Matrix and met with scientists and researchers there, who were very generous in answering all the questions posed by the students. The students visited other pilot scale facilities and labs as well. Students got introduced to Praj’s efforts in ethanol production from biowaste, biofertilizers and other products. At the end of the visit, students felt that this visit was really useful and it was a great opportunity to learn by touring live-plants and an industrial R&D center. Students felt that such visits really help them understand industrial research and gave them a first-hand exposure to industrial processes and research initiatives.

- Posted by Omkar

Science communication workshop for researchers and students by NCL-TEC

A science communication workshop was successfully organized by NCL-TEC on January 5^th , 2011 at PAM building auditorium in NCL, Pune. The theme of this event was to make aware young researchers and students about science communication. Over 50 Students from NCL and IISER actively participated in the event. He was introduced by Gouri and was presented a bouquet by Shraddha, both NCL-TEC Executive Committee members.

The speaker argued that there is a need to communicate science beyond our academic community because it is important to:

o Make it accessible to the common people

o Helps to communicate well even with your scientific collaborators

o Becomes easier to get funding for your research

o Reach wider audience

Science communication can be done by various means – journals, news media, blogs (increasingly popular), blogging is the most easiest way to communicate these days

He gave a 30 min talk, in which introduced his PhD work, and spoke about how initially he had difficulty effectively communicating his work to people with non-science background- he was not able to communicate the essence of this research in a straightforward way

His talk was followed by a Q&A session, during which students actively interacted with the speaker. Then there was a short break, during which tea and samosa was served. This was followed by a participatory workshop for about an hour. During the workshop, the speaker discussed about the various elements in a scientific article. The speaker distributed a scientific paper among the participants, and asked them to summarize it in their own words, and give it an attractive title. At the end of the workshop, the participants read out their write-ups. There was enthusiastic response from the students for this.

Some of the tips that he gave was:

§ Have an attractive headline

§ Keep the article short and crisp

§ Avoid grammatical errors

§ Use active voice

§ Use graphics as much as possible

§ Avoid jargon

The speaker also provided other resources (like blogs, websites etc.) which students can use in the future. NCL-TEC members presented the speaker a memento as a token of their appreciation. Even after the workshop was over, students encircled the speaker and questioned, interacted with him about science communication and other issues. The event was a grand success!!!

Posted by:Sanjay & Nidhi