IIITH Faculty receive ANRF Early Career Research Grant
Three professors at the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad have received research grants by the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) to grow and foster a culture of research and innovation in the country. Prof. Chittaranjan Hens, Centre for Computational Natural Sciences and Bioinformatics, Prof. Karthik Vaidyanathan, Software Engineering Research Centre and Prof. Gowtham Kurri, Signal Processing and Communications Research Centre have been awarded the Prime Minister’s Early Career Research Grant initiated under the Anusandhan National Research Foundation which supports young researchers in initiating their research careers in a new institution with the help of a flexible budget and progressive initiatives for the ease of doing research. Each research grant which is meant for young researchers no older than 42 years of age provides up to 60 lakhs plus overheads for a period of 3 years.
Crop Darpan App developed by IIITH to help farmers diagnose crop health issues
A research team from IIITH led by Prof. P Krishna Reddy, in collaboration with scientists from Professor Jayashankar Telangana State Agricultural University (PJTSAU), has launched Version 2 of the Crop Darpan app, an AI-powered mobile tool designed to help farmers instantly diagnose crop health issues. Development of Crop Darpan is part of a joint research initiative between India and Japan under the India-Japan Joint Research Laboratory project. The initiative, titled ‘Data Science-based Farming Support System for Sustainable Crop Production under Climatic Change’, involves multiple institutes, including IITH, IITB, PJTSAU, and the University of Tokyo. Crop Darpan helps farmers detect issues in rice and cotton crops, including pest infestations, bacterial and fungal diseases, and nutrient deficiencies. The app not only diagnoses problems but also offers scientific guidance on corrective measures.
Kohli Day 2025
The International Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad (IIITH), which houses the Kohli Centre on Intelligent Systems (KCIS), established the Centre for Digital Technologies in Healthcare (CDiTH). This is in collaboration with AIG Hospital, which is now marketed as an AI (artificial intelligence) medical facility. Prof PJ Narayanan, director of IIITH stated that CDiTH is a translation lab developed to use current digital technologies to improve the efficacy and economy of healthcare delivery for real-world impact in India and around the world by efficiently linking academic research and clinical practice. “AIG does 2,000 plus surgeries a month. Emergencies may develop in any of these patients. But, by using AI, in our hospital, we can avoid the ‘Code Blue’ situation and be able to save three lives a day. ‘Code Blue’ is a universal emergency signalling a medical alert to seek immediate attention,” said Dr. D Nageshwar Reddy, chairman, AIG Hospitals while inaugurating the CDiTH
Multi-agent AI framework for cloud operations
A joint research effort between the IIITH and cloud automation startup MontyCloud led to a breakthrough in multi-agent AI architecture. The work, aimed at improving cloud operations, has been shortlisted for the best paper award at the prestigious International Conference CAIN-2025. It’s based on the Meta Orchestrator of Your Agents (MOYA), which enables multiple AI agents to collaborate on cloud management tasks. Unlike traditional models that rely on a single large language model (LLM), MOYA distributes responsibilities among specialised agents, allowing for greater flexibility and efficiency. Managing cloud operations involves handling vast amounts of data, automating workflows and ensuring compliance with security and performance standards. IIITH’s Software Architecture for Sustainability (SA4S) group, led by Prof. Karthik V, initially developed a conversational AI copilot named Marvin to assist users with cloud tasks.
Digital twin for water utility network
Water is one of the most precious resources in urban areas, yet a significant amount is wasted due to leakages, inefficient distribution, and excessive usage. To tackle this issue, Smart Living Lab has developed a Digital Twin for water utility networks which digitally represents a physical item or assembly using integrated simulations and service data. The digital representation holds information from multiple sources across the product life cycle. This information is continuously updated and visualised in various ways to predict current and future conditions in both design and operational environments to enhance decision-making. The Digital Twin is best described as the effortless integration of data between a physical and virtual machine in either. In general, many smart city deployments have become expensive and large as there are no platforms to evaluate the plan and the requirements before actual deployment.
CIE@IIITH showcases 25 research connected startups at the Annual R&D showcase
IIITH celebrated its research excellence at R&D Showcase 2025, featuring over 400+ recent research works from 28 research centers. As part of this grand celebration, CIE the institute’s innovation and entrepreneurship hub showcased its deeptech startups. These startups have been actively engaging with IIITH’s research and faculty. Among the 40+ startups that have engaged with IIITH faculty and research, 25 promising startups were featured at the R&D Startup Showcase. These ventures span multiple deeptech domains, including DeepAI, Lifesciences, Engineering, Mobility, and SaaS, ServiceTech, demonstrating impactful technological advancements. The Hyderabad Innovation Ecosystem including VCs, corporates, mentors, ecosystem enablers, faculty, researchers, and students were invited to interact with these trailblazing startups.
Prof. P J Narayanan’s interview with DataQuest
Indian academic corridors are standing between two atriums. On the one hand, some struggle with concerns on integrity in academic research (Whether in publications or
corporate projects).. On the other hand, some are driving front-runner work in drug discovery, cancer imaging, clinical research, road safety and environmental impact. Let’s find out where India is heading as we enter the Sophomore level in AI. It is very sad and unfortunate for India to get such notoriety with respect to academic honesty. We must establish models and incentives that promote honest work and just rewards. The regulatory mechanism insists on doctoral degrees for all faculty in all kinds of institutions. Good understanding and teaching abilities must suffice to do well in teaching institutions that form the bulk of our higher education institutions. Everyone wants a PhD despite their own aspirations or guidance available.
R&D Showcase 2025
IIITH’s annual R&D Showcase provided a unique opportunity for viewers to interact with faculty and students to understand their work in more tangible forms through demos, prototypes and presentations in keeping with the institute’s endeavour to promote applied research that benefits society. This year’s Showcase was themed Tech for Sustainable Futures was held on 8 and 9 March. The Showcase included 300+ research posters, demos and models from IIITH’s 28 research centres, confluences, research reflections and a research startup showcase by Centre for Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE). The event had roundtable discussions, plenary panel discussions, student seminars, industry-research dialogues etc. Prof. Martial Herbet, Dean and University Professor of Robotics, School of Computer Science, CMU gave the inaugural talk on Challenges towards the next generation of AI sytems.
Facing the Reality of Modern AI
Modern AI is poised to ignite the world — in all senses! Built upon different architectures of deep neural networks, Large Language Models (LLMs) and Large Vision Models (LVMs) enable computers to understand and generate text and visual content. They are not just transforming industries, they are reshaping the very fabric of how we seek and express knowledge in the ocean of data in the world, most of which cannot be known by any single human individual. As academia and industry come together to unlock their full potential, it’s crucial to examine the workings behind these models, and look at the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. At the core, there really is no magic. The models are designed to recognise patterns, generate content or make predictions by minimising a loss function by propagating errors backwards through multiple deep layers of a neural network, arranged in various architectures.
IIITH’s Smart Fix for Hyderabad’s Water Woes
IIITH along with treating water for reuse and collecting rainwater, made use of various smart solutions – in-house sensors and the creation of a digital twin, among others to preserve water and responsibly use it. According to researchers, one of the foremost things needed to address water woes is to understand the water consumption to plug leakages and also remove illegal connections. They also measure water quantity and quality using sensors. Wherever possible, the institute uses water treated through sewage treatment plants (STP) or collecting using rainwater harvesting so that the groundwater and even water supplied by the HMWSSB remains untouched or at least minimised. They have signed an MoU to run a trial to see if the IIITH model can be implemented in a nearby colony. Smart City Living Lab, IIITH is also in talks with other municipalities to help them address water woes.