This Article is From Aug 19, 2015

Young Indians in Class Now With 15 Nobel Laureates

India has sent a delegation of 13 young thinkers to be a part of the programme.

Jerusalem, Israel: Israel, a hotbed for start-ups, is incubating a special new project. 15 Nobel Prize winners are spending six days in Jerusalem mentoring 400 students from 70 different countries, including India.

The students are 18 to 25 years in age. The concepts they're pitching include how modern physics and mathematics can be used to understand signalling and memory within the brain; something you and I might find a little easier to understand - how to develop a new light-weight plastic battery for capturing and storing solar energy. The Nobel laureates offer brief feedback on whether the  premises and projects are worth pursuing.

But the real prize is in listening to them explain their award-winning work as well as the accounts of how they often struggled while making it to the top.

Israel's invite to delegates is also seen as a diplomatic and PR exercise at a time when it's being heavily criticized for the conflict in Gaza last year and for attacking Iran's new nuclear deal.

India has sent a delegation of 13 young thinkers who excitedly described the conference as "a Kumbh Mela of scientists."

"It is a dream come true to interact with the Nobel laureates, who are really human like you and me, but have worked hard and long in their fields," said Aayush, 20, who goes only by her first name and belongs to Mohali.

The last time India won a Nobel Prize for Science was in 1930 when CV Raman was honoured for his work in Physics.

The Nobel Laureates who are teaching this conference gracefully declare it's a learning experience for them as well. "These are really very bright minds and can become leaders of science in times to come," said Dr. Zhores I Alferov, who won the Nobel for Physics in 2000.
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