Prime Minister Narendra Modi has appointed Dr Srivari Chandrasekhar as the Director of CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (CSIR-IICT). The institute comes under the Central Government and the Prime Minister serves as its President. Dr Harsh Vardhan who is Cabinet Minister for Science & Technology and Earth Sciences is the Vice President of the premier research body.
Dr Chandrasekhar took the seat of the Director of CSIR-IICT with effect from 8 June 2015. The senior scientist earned his BSc, MSc and PhD degrees from Osmania University, and then did post-doctoral research at the UT Southwestern Medical Center in the US. He won the 2014 Infosys Prize in Physical Sciences for contributions to organic chemistry, especially focused on the synthesis of complex molecules derived from purely natural sources.
Since joining CSIR-IICT in 1986 as a Junior Research Fellow, Dr Chandrasekhar has stepped into the shoes of Chief Scientist and Head of the Division of Natural Products Chemistry at the reputed institute. He is credited with pushing for the set up of the National Mol Bank (NMB), a state-of-the-art automated compound storage and retrieval system that is jointly funded by the Department of Science & Technology and CSIR.
It was built to cater to the specific requirements of sample management for various of applications including but not restricted to biotechnological, pharmaceutical, agrochemical and specialty chemicals. Dr Chandrasekhar has made many noteworthy leaps in affordable healthcare, and has many pharma companies interested in him. This includes his work on the synthesis of Bedaquiline for treating multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis.
Dr Chandrasekhar and his team at CSIR-IICT also created a scalable synthetic route for Misoprostol which is used to stave off gastric ulcer, induce labor or terminate unwanted pregnancies safely. He has also mentored many doctoral and post-doctoral students, and will obviously make for an inspirational Director of CSIR-IICT.