This year’s National Winner of the Cell press TNQ Inspiring Science Award was a graduate student from Dr. Akash Gulyani’s lab at inStem. Nishan Shettigar was one among six finalists, nominated for his work on natural light-sensing in planarians; work that was conducted under the guidance of Dr. Gulyani, and in collaboration with Dr. Dasaradhi Palakodeti. On the 17th of January, 2018 Nishan was declared the winner at the The Cell Press-TNQ India Distinguished Lectureship Series lecture at NIMHANS, Bengaluru, and was awarded a medal and a laptop by Prof David Anderson and Cell Press CEO, Emilie Marcus.
Nishan’s work has revealed that organisms that possess seemingly, “simple eyes” and “primitive” brains are capable of extremely fine and sophisticated light sensing and processing. This discovery was published in the article, “Hierarchies in light sensing and dynamic interactions between ocular and extraocular sensory networks in a flatworm” published in Science Advances in July last year.
The Inspiring Science Award is an annual award given to the best published scientific paper in the Life Sciences from India. This award was constituted in the year 2016 to reward quality science, inspire scholarship and support researchers to pursue their passion in the life sciences. As this year’s winner, Nishan will also receive a full travel fellowship to attend one of the 2018 Cell Symposia held across different locations around the world.
