Reflections on an Onam Feast
Covid’s unique contribution to our way of living is the proliferation of entities supplying cooked food at home. Thanks to one such...
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John Pucadyil
- Sep 17, 2022
- 6 min
A Lifetime of Reading
As the eldest child, I had the run of the house. One great pleasure was rummaging through the collection of old books and magazines....
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John Pucadyil
- Sep 8, 2022
- 5 min
Experiments with Plasmas
There are two ways of learning new things. In one, you read up everything (prior art in the patent patois) on the field before doing...
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John Pucadyil
- Sep 3, 2022
- 6 min
The IBIS Trilogy
Amitav Ghosh’s books are read extensively and are admired by both readers and critics. Though born in India, he is now a citizen of the...
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John Pucadyil
- Sep 3, 2022
- 5 min
Return on Investment
Mercy auntie was on the phone. Could I go over to her place in Cochin next Saturday? There was a function celebrating her 60th...
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John Pucadyil
- Aug 20, 2022
- 4 min
Innovation Cycles and Industrial Revolutions
Industrial growth is characterised by surges with an extended period, typically 40–60 years, driven by clusters of innovations. New...
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John Pucadyil
- Aug 12, 2022
- 5 min
Colours of Hydrogen
Hydrogen burns with a blue colour. This attribute has nothing to do with the appellation ‘Blue Hydrogen,’ which is the name for...
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John Pucadyil
- Aug 5, 2022
- 6 min
Remembering Predhiman Kaw
I met Predhiman Kaw for the first time in 1972 when I visited the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) to give a talk on my work on plasma...
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John Pucadyil
- Jul 29, 2022
- 5 min
A Miracle at Muvattupuzha
John Kuriakose is the Managing Director of DentCare Dental Lab, a company focusing on fabricating dental prostheses. DentCare has...
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John Pucadyil
- Jul 14, 2022
- 6 min
A Viennese Interlude
A train carrying Hindu karsevaks returning from Ayodhya was set on fire in Godhra in Gujarat on the 27th of February 2002, leading to...
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John Pucadyil
- Jul 6, 2022
- 5 min
Backwater Memories
My father’s elder brother lived in Cochin. We called him Achan. He worked with Volkart Brothers, a Swiss Company and used to live in...
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John Pucadyil
- Jul 1, 2022
- 5 min
From Roja to Rahmania
It was a rainy afternoon. But my friend Sanjay Zaveri insisted that I and my wife, should accompany him to see a film called Roja. He...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 26, 2022
- 6 min
An Affinity for Science
Courtesy Pexels Experiments with strips of films projected onto the wall using sunlight and a lens were the earliest memory of dabbling...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 20, 2022
- 5 min
An Edupreneur’s Story
Baby John is in his forties. Above-average height, slightly dark-complexioned, regular features, he has a determined look. He founded...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 15, 2022
- 5 min
Ambient Pressure Cold Plasma Jets
The great American scientist Irving Langmuir was the first to use the term plasma in 1927 to describe the glowing, ionised state of...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 11, 2022
- 5 min
Cheques and Balances
Stephen Leacock, a Canadian humorist, has satirized his traumatic encounter with banks in the short story ‘My Financial Career’. He says...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 6, 2022
- 5 min
Voices From Behind the Glass Wall
The child sits in a corner, aloof and not looking at anything. It is as if he perceives the world from behind a glass wall. It becomes...
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John Pucadyil
- Jun 4, 2022
- 6 min
India Stack: a Transformative Technology
Economist, in its 2022 May 13th issue, wrote: “As India emerges from the pandemic, however, a new pattern of growth is visible. It is...
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John Pucadyil
- May 28, 2022
- 7 min
The Fusion Mavericks
Figure courtesy IPP Garching In early 1951, Argentine President Juan Perón made a startling claim that a group of scientists under his...
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John Pucadyil
- May 21, 2022
- 4 min
A 'Stray Dog' Story
We were driving back from the shop. The car had passed through the campus and entered the road leading to my house. Then I saw the dog...
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John Pucadyil
- May 14, 2022
- 5 min
The Pursuit of Crime - Facts, Evidence and Intuition
Humanity and crime have co-existed forever, as you see from Biblical stories to post-apocalyptic thrillers. We also admire the...
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John Pucadyil
- May 6, 2022
- 6 min
Life as Physics
Questions about life and its purpose concern all of us. There are recurring debates on this by Scientists, Philosophers and Religious...
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John Pucadyil
- Apr 30, 2022
- 5 min
Kunal Kamra and te Comedy of Dissent
Theatre has long been used as a means of communicating protest against the establishment and for creating new perceptions of social...
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John Pucadyil
- Apr 23, 2022
- 5 min
India and the ITER Project
Thermonuclear fusion reactions power our Sun and the stars. However, the physics of nuclear fusion started becoming clear only in the...
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