While many software professionals in Karnataka look for jobs in the IT services industry, some of them can also look at options in areas like astronomy, which involve a lot of number crunching, said the Chair for the Infosys Prize.

Speaking to Business Line after a talk as part of the Infosys Prize Lecture Series at the IISc, Professor S.R. Kulkarni, McArthur Professor of Astronomy and Professor of Planetary Sciences at the California Institute of Technology, said, “Twenty years ago, if you got into electronics, you could do research. Software is today in the same boat." He said that there are over one tera entries (a tera is the number one followed by twelve zeroes) in his database and this would provide a challenging software problem for software professionals.

Talking about the demand for software in astronomy in places like the Palomar Observatories, Prof Kulkarni said that from 2007 to 2011, the capital expenditure and the operational expenditure together totalled around $2.5 million, while around $10 million was spent on software.

Discussing the discoveries of scientists in black holes and supernovae and the practical knowledge that one could gain from them, Prof Kulkarni said that Maxwell's equations date back to around 1862 and at that time, nobody understood what they did, but today, modern communications like cell phones depend on Maxwell's equations.

Prof Kulkarni said that Infosys, though its science prize, should work on making science more fashionable. “People see successful people in business like Mr N.R. Narayana Murthy and the impact that they have made,” he said and pointed out that science also needed such role models. While practical science was important, he said that one also needed to look at the bigger picture. “Science is a hallmark of culture and civilisation,” he said.

Balaji.n@thehindu.co.in

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