Leap of faith!
Author: Mihir Kapse
The time you choose to do something right despite all the negative things you see down that road- that’s a leap of faith. There are multiple ways to look at it. People will ask what is ‘right’ here. My experience has led me to this: ‘Right’ is anything you do that makes you feel more alive. I recently came across this quote that said, “We only live once. Wrong! We only die once. We live every day!”
Anand Srivastava, Professor at the Molecular Biophysics Unit, never really thought of working on biomolecules during his Undergrad. You might be surprised to learn that he actually did his undergrad in Naval Architecture, which is in no way related to his current work on molecular simulation of biological systems. There was no particular reason he chose engineering back then. He got into IIT Kharagpur based on his rank, and he liked the institute when he visited it with his family. In retrospect, he mentions that it was a good end-to-end engineering program. However, because he disliked studying, Anand went straight into a corporate job after graduating in 2002.
During the 2 years that he worked in a corporate environment, he saw that the people doing the most interesting work were those with a PhD. This inspired him to return to academia and pursue research. He joined a Master’s program to see if he liked it. He wanted to learn how nanocomposite materials worked. “At that time, nanotechnology was an emerging field of research,” he recalls. Fortunately, he landed an NSF fellowship, which gave him the freedom to choose the people he would work with and the topics he wanted to work on. He joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Ohio State University. Under the guidance of a co-advisor from the Chemical Engineering department, he worked on nanomaterials, specifically on identifying nanoscale regimes where bulk materials change their properties and how the design principles for using these materials must change.
While pursuing his PhD, Anand joined an Indian Association magazine at the university. Once, he was assigned to go around departments and ask Indian-origin professors what drove them towards research; he recalls this as a very important moment in his life, “But one thing stood out,” he mentions, “I never found any one professor- I interviewed 20 of them- and I never found out one person among them who said that they hated the job.” This changed Anand’s perspective towards academia.
Amid his work on nanomaterials and their properties at the molecular level, Anand realized that the tools he used to study the molecular world were not well grounded in theory. They were more empirical. This brought in big assumptions, which created a large margin of errors. The models used were not fundamentally grounded in quantum effects and statistical mechanical principles at the molecular level. This limitation sparked his interest in building the connection between the molecular and bulk properties of materials. For example, in the kinetic theory of gases, the temperature of a gas (a bulk property) is dependent on its molecular velocity (a molecular property). He wanted to learn to develop models that would allow him to build this connection between molecules and materials. Thus, he joined Gregory Voth’s lab at the University of Chicago as a Postdoc, where he worked towards developing such models.
“What degree will you get after this (Postdoc)?” Anand humorously refers to his mother asking him, back in those days.
Certain of his ability to produce results with polymer materials, Anand’s PI wanted him to work on them. Anand, however, chose to work on biomolecules. Inspired by the story of Max Perutz solving the structure of haemoglobin and its impact on society, he saw that he could connect the molecular world with the living world. This excited him more than materials research. The impact on society and the desire to contribute to human health drove Anand towards biology. Moving forward, his work would lead to his appointment at IISc as an Assistant Professor.
“I don’t see it as a big victory that I have achieved. It is just a journey, and I just happened to be at the right place at the right time when I joined,” remarked Anand.
Anand began his training as a naval architect, studied nanomaterials for 5 years in a mechanical engineering department and finally completed his postdoc in a chemistry department, working on biomolecules. He went from studying solid mechanics to statistical mechanics.
“I am also a little bit more foolhardy that way. Like sometimes I jump before I think, so that’s my problem too,” shares Anand. “Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. You can call it foolish, you can call it ignorance, ignorance leading to something nice.”
Challenges like finding a good university, giving exams, and later teaching biology to students at IISc were present throughout Anand’s journey. Still, with support from his family and friends, he got through them. “My parents had strong trust in me. If I were happy, they didn’t care about (anything else),” shared Anand.
Looking at Professor Anand’s life, maybe sometimes it is a good idea to just ‘jump’. Who knows what lies ahead?