IIITH Researchers use Math to decode living systems
Scientists use mathematical models to explain why mosquito populations surge after rain, how species disappear without warning or why ecosystems recover when a missing element is restored. At International Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad (IIITH), researchers are using reaction networks and dynamical systems to study these hidden patterns in living systems. Prof. Abhishek Deshpande from the Center for Computational Natural Sciences and Bioinformatics said the reaction networks helped scientists understand chains of cause and effect. He pointed to the Yellowstone example in the United States, where wolves were reintroduced about 30 years ago after their numbers had collapsed. Elk populations had risen sharply in their absence, damaging young trees and riverbanks. Prof. Deshpande explained, “When wolves returned, the balance shifted again. It showed how one species can influence everything around it. Reaction networks help us explain why such changes unfold the way they do.”
The Invisible Signature of AI-Washed IP
AI “washing” alters code, designs, or media just enough to obscure ownership, creating an attribution gap for IP law. New forensic methods; lineage tracing, deep similarity analysis, and training-data provenance are emerging to prove algorithmic theft. When a piece of copyrighted code, a proprietary design, or a unique musical composition is fed into a Generative AI model for washing, the goal is to retain the core value and structure of the original work while subtly altering its metadata and stylistic features, enough to erase the ownership trail. This algorithmic transformation creates a derivative work that is technically new yet functionally identical to the stolen IP. “Until more research on detecting such manipulation and identification is established with scientific rigor, it would always depend on expert testimony and counter expert testimony. But the hope is that it won’t be that distant future that such scientifically rigorous methods will be established for acceptance by judiciary.” said Prof Sandeep K Shukla, Director, IIIT Hyderabad.
Prof. Sandeep K Shukla on evolution of cybersecurity
Cybersecurity isn’t just about protecting data anymore, it’s about defending the digital backbone of modern India. Every connection represents an opportunity for increased risk, be it through UPI payments or the power grid. Prior to it being a popular and widely discussed trend in the world, Prof. Sandeep K Shukla, has been ahead of the curve on all things relating to this concept. He speaks about the next steps in securing India’s critical infrastructure, and utilising AI for protection against cyber threats. In 2002–03, it was viewed as a system administrator’s problem. Attacks like Code Red were routine, and research focused on cryptography, which was ineffective once malware exploited software flaws. A global vulnerability market soon emerged, where zero-day, zero-click bugs in major platforms became million-dollar assets traded legally and on the dark web, sustaining a government, criminal exploit ecosystem. Stuxnet in 2010 transformed the field. Using unknown vulnerabilities, it damaged Iran’s Natanz facility and proved cyberattacks could disrupt physical systems worldwide.
IIITH hosts launch of NITI Ayog’s quantum roadmap and Telangana’s quantum strategy
International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Hyderabad hosted the launch of ‘Transforming India into a leading Quantum-powered Economy in the presence of NITI Aayog Chief Executive Officer B V Subrahmanyam, Telangana IT and Industries Minister D Sridhar Babu, Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, NITI Aayog Member V K Saraswat, and NITI Frontier Tech Hub Chief Architect Debjani Ghosh. Addressing a gathering after launching the roadmap, NITI Aayog Chief Executive Officer B V Subrahmanyam called for concerted efforts to make India a top-three quantum economy by 2025. Hyderabad has all the ingredients to become the country’s Quantum City. Telangana’s quantum policy is in sync with the national strategy. It can deliver results much faster.” It sets a target to incubate at least 10 globally competitive quantum start-ups, each surpassing $100 million in revenue; achieve Quantum Atmanirbharata and control critical points in global supply chains; and capture over 50 per cent of the value in the global quantum software and services market by 2035.
Team Nexus wins award at International oneM2M Hackathon for fifth consecutive year
IIITH’s Smart City Living Lab team won ‘Best Promotion of oneM2M’ Award (3rd Prize) along with a cash award of 500,000 KRW at the 2025 International oneM2M Hackathon (8th Mobius Developer Challenge), marking the 5th consecutive win for the IIITH at this global event. This year’s recognition celebrates the team’s innovative project, “oneM2M-enabled AI for Resilient Building Systems.” The idea behind it is simple but powerful: How can buildings think smarter, respond faster, and stay resilient—no matter the situation? Their solution blends oneM2M’s interoperable IoT framework with AI-driven intelligence to create buildings that automatically detect issues, adjust conditions, save energy, and keep occupants safe. It is a bold step toward the future of intelligent, sustainable spaces. Team Nexus (Likhith Kanigolla, Kartik Gharde, Peri Reddy Vaka, and Nishitha Varma) brought this idea to life. They were mentored by Ms. Anuradha Vattem and Dr. Karthik Vaidhyanathan.
IIITH Prof. Shows How Simple Quantum Circuits Spoof Thermalization
Research revealing how “thermal” behaviour can emerge from low-complexity dynamics and not necessarily extremely chaotic ones, has been published in the prestigious journal Physical Review Letters. In everyday life, objects equilibrate with the environment. “A steaming cup of tea left on your desk eventually reaches room temperature, losing almost all memory of how it was heated,” says Prof. Shantanav Chakraborty, Center for Quantum Science and Technology, IIITH. He is referring to the process known as thermalization in Physics, where many-particle systems evolve towards equilibrium. “Here, only a few coarse properties, like temperature or energy, matter, and the fine details of the past are effectively forgotten”. According to the professor, quantum physics can mimic thermalization but in an intriguing manner. “A large quantum system can be in a perfectly well-defined pure state, evolving deterministically under Schrödinger’s equation, and yet any small part of it can still look completely random and ‘thermal’”, he says.
IIITH reputation on par with IITs, NIRF not a concern
Prof. Sandeep K Shukla, director of IIIT Hyderabad, in an exclusive interview with Careers360, speaks about the institute’s research-oriented vision, focus on gender and socio-economic diversity, and special admission channels designed for students from underprivileged backgrounds. He also highlighted the direct admission pathways for students from state boards, scholarships offered, how US universities excel and the lessons that can be learnt. IIIT Hyderabad has already established itself as a socially conscious, research-driven institution — one that applies technology to address real societal challenges. Whether it’s through projects Bhashini, our language technology initiatives, or work in computer vision and related areas, the institute has built a strong foundation in research that serves social causes. I believe the next major goal for India — and for IIIT Hyderabad — is to move toward technological sovereignty. Today, we depend heavily on global corporations for almost every layer of our digital infrastructure – from cloud services and operating systems to semiconductors and enterprise applications.
How to bring about a social revolution not through charity but innovation
A recent AIC-IIITH research report highlighted that less that 0.2% of India’s annual CSR funds go towards innovation. This prompted a roundtable discussion of related stakeholders to brainstorm on the existing gaps and suggestions on how CSR can evolve from a mere duty to a catalyst for innovation and impact. Below are the highlights. When India’s startup ecosystem crossed 90,000 registered ventures, it became clear that innovation had firmly taken root in the country’s economic imagination. Yet, despite this explosion of ideas and enterprise, one question lingers: why are India’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funds – running into tens of thousands of crores each year – not flowing toward the country’s innovators? It’s a paradox hiding in plain sight. The law already allows it. Schedule VII of the Companies Act explicitly lists technology incubators and research as eligible areas for CSR spending. And yet, less than 0.2% of India’s annual CSR corpus finds its way to startup innovation. These were the findings of AIC-IIITH’s recent research.
From Language to Intelligence: Prof. Rajeev Sangal’s Legacy in India’s AI Journey
Prof. Rajeev Sangal discusses his reservations about open-sourcing Indic language datasets, the roadmap for Bhashini 2.0, and what he expects at the India AI Impact Summit. When Mission Bhashini was first conceived under MeitY in 2018-19, it promised to bridge India’s language divide by developing speech-to-text AI models and multilingual translation tools. The timing proved prescient, coming four years before OpenAI launched ChatGPT in 2022 which set off the global AI arms race. Today, Indian AI startups are racing to build Indic large language models (LLMs) in an effort to catch up to global tech giants. While key players such as Sarvam AI, krutrim, and the BharatGPT consortium have launched foundational AI models with support across several Indic languages, progress in this domain has been slow due to the lack of digitised, labeled, and cleaned training datasets. Since Indian language content on the internet is limited, developers have had to source language data from a variety of other places in order to train LLMs that understand how Indians actually speak or ask queries.
Bahu Bhasa 2025 – Reimagining Future of Indian Languages
The Open Knowledge Initiatives (OKI) and the Language Technologies Research Centre (LTRC) organized Bahu Bhasa 2025 at the International Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad from 6 to 8 November 2025. The event was an effort to engage with the current discourse on Indian languages from the perspectives of policy, technology and community, with the objective of bringing them in conversation with each other. The name “Bahu Bhasa” (not “Bhasha”) challenges linguistic hierarchy that privileges standardized, script-bound languages with institutional power. The event was not only a celebration of Indian languages, but a space to ask difficult, necessary questions about preservation, access, and equity in a rapidly digitizing world. In the opening remarks on Day 1, Prof. Deva Priyakumar (Dean, R&D, IIIT Hyderabad) urged researchers to move beyond academic publications to develop tools that solve real-world communication challenges. Prof. Vasudeva Varma, Head, LTRC described a “silent crisis of storytelling,” urging that India must make its linguistic heritage open, lest others define it for us.