Deans of Faculties

Dean, Faculty of Engineering
Prof. Jayant R Haritsa
Email: dean.engg@iisc.ac.in
Contact: +91 80 2293 2044, 2956

Jayant Haritsa is a Professor in the CDS and CSA departments at the Indian Institute of Science for the past three decades. He has contributed to the design, implementation and evaluation of relational database engines, which underpin modern enterprise information systems. He received a BTech degree from the Indian Institute of Technology (Madras), and MS and PhD degrees from the University of Wisconsin (Madison), USA. He is a Fellow of ACM and IEEE, and all four Indian science and engineering academies.  His work has been recognized by several awards, including Swarnajayanti Fellowship, Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award, Infosys Prize, and Distinguished Alumnus of IIT Madras. He was the President of ACM India during 2020-22. He has been the Program Co-Chair for IEEE ICDE 2010 and VLDB 2016, and the General Co-Chair for ACM SIGMOD 2026, all premier international database conferences. He has served on the editorial board of ACM Books and co-chaired the ACM Presidential Task Force on Regional Offices.  At IISc, he was the Chair of the CSA department during 2014-2017.

Dean, Faculty of Science
Prof. Usha Vijayraghavan
Email: dean.sci@iisc.ac.in
Contact:91–80– 2293 2033, 2271

Usha Vijayraghavan did her undergraduate studies from Delhi University with University Gold Medal, and her master’s from the Post-Graduate Institute of Medical Research Chandigarh, with the top position. She obtained her Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) USA, in 1989 for her work on yeast genetics. She continued at Caltech for her post-doctoral research on genetic factors that control plant development. She joined IISc in 1990 and is currently a Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology. Her research and teaching interests are on gene regulatory mechanisms that influence cell fate and differentiation using genetically tractable plant and yeast models. A specific focus is on regulatory networks that control the rice flowering-stem and flower development. She is a fellow of the Indian National Science Academy, the Indian Academy of Sciences, and held the JC Bose National Fellowship for ten years. Her work has been recognised by awards such as The National Bioscience Award of the Department of Biotechnology, The HarSwarup Medal of the Indian National Science Academy, and the C. V. Raman award of the Karnataka State Science and Technology Council.

Dean, Undergraduate Program
Prof. Prabal K. Maiti
Email: dean.ug@iisc.ac.in
Contact: 91-80-2293 3554/2825/3184

Prabal K. Maiti is a Professor in the Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. He served as chair of the Physics department and Center for Cryogenic Technology (CCT) from 2018-2023. Prof Maiti received his M.Sc and Ph.D. degrees in Physics from IIT, Kanpur, India followed by postdoctoral stays at MPIP, Mainz, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Caltech, USA. He is a fellow of Indian Academy of Science (IASc), Indian National Science Academy (INSA) and the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC). Currently, he is an associate editor of PCCP published by Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). His other awards/honors include Alexander Humboldt fellowship and Fulbright fellowship. He works in the area of Multiscale Modelling of Soft and Bio-materials. Current research interests are in the area of confined fluid, nucleic acid nanotechnology, charge transport in biomolecules, HIV inhibition, membrane biophysics and physics for sustainability.

Associate Dean, Undergraduate Program (B.S)
Prof. Dipshikha Chakravortty
Email: ascdean.ugacad@iisc.ac.in
Contact: 91- 80 – 2293 3554 / 2892

Dipshikha Chakravortty is a Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology, Indian Institute of Science (IISc). Until 2022, she was the Astra Chair Professor at the Institute. She is a Humboldt fellow and did her research work at FAU, Erlangen, Germany. She did her Master’s in Microbiology from Nagpur University and PhD from the National Center of Cell Science, Pune. Her research focuses on infectious diseases and vaccine development. Her work has been published in top biological journals, including Journal of Experimental Medicine, EMBO J, Journal of Immunology, Infection and Immunity, J Clim Microbiology, AAC, and J Antimicrobial Chemotherapy.

She has won many awards such as the DAE Outstanding Investigator Award, National Bioscience Award, NASI-Reliance Industries Platinum Jubilee award, and more. She is a fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, India; the Indian National Science Academy, Delhi and the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore. She is involved in the editorial board of many journals like Virulence, Innate Immunity, Journal of Bioscience, Frontiers in Microbiology, and so on. She serves as a reviewer for reputed journals such as the Lancet, Nature Communications, and MMBR, to name a few. Her research has been supported by grants from the Department of Science and Technology, India; Department of Biotechnology, India; Indian Council of Medical Research, and Department of Atomic Energy.

She has more than 175 papers in international journals, and has guided 24 students so far towards their PhD. More than 200 summers trainees and 60 Academy summer trainees have worked in her lab. Most of her PhD students are faculty members in reputed institutions like IISc, BITS Pilani and NIT. She was the Chair of Wardens from 2019 to 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic. She also served as the Chair of ICASH from 2015-2021, and as the Integrated PhD coordinator till August 2023. She serves as a member of scientific advisory committees in institutes of national importance, and is part of various committees in DST, DBT and ICMR involved in decision making. She is a passionate teacher and teaches students across diverse disciplines including UG, PhD and Int PhD students. Her vision is to instill the knowledge of microbiology in every individual towards understanding the importance of microbes in health and life.

Associate Dean, Undergraduate Program (B.Tech)
Prof. Srikanth Krishnan Iyer
Email: skiyer@iisc.ac.in
Contact: 080-22933327

Srikanth Iyer received his M.Sc. (5yr Integrated) degree in Statistics from IIT-Kanpur in 1990 and his Ph.D. from the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1994. He had a year and half stint as a post doc at the Technion and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He joined the faculty of IIT-Kanpur in 1996 and subsequently moved to IISc in 2004. His research interests include stochastic geometry, mathematical finance, and branching processes.