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The Curious Zookeeper of Extraordinary Organisms

In his backyard in Atlanta,Saad Bhamla, professor of chemical and biomolecular Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology, observed the glassy sharpshooter with interest. The lightweight insect was urinating in droplets which it super-propelled into the distance. Later, a high-speed camera would reveal that the bead of urine travels...

I am a graduate of the Science Journalism program at Boston University.

I chase stories on all topics of interest. I go where the reporting takes me. This website is a digital portfolio of my select articles and essays. I also translate short stories from Tamil, which is my first language. Feel free to contact me at my email address above.

FOOD & TRAVEL

Casteless Collective & Modi Mastan

The stars twinkled overhead, and sparks flew from the embers of corn sellers’ coal stoves at Besant Nagar Beach. It was a typical Sunday evening crowd—families, couples and vendors. But at the far end, in the Urur Olcott fishing village, something interesting was underway: the...

Measuring Blood with Light

Some components of blood can be measured without a needle stick. Now an innovation in light-based methods could make even more of them visible. For about 40 years, physicians have been able to measure some qualities of blood using pulses of light. A recent breakthrough...

City Lights, Vanishing Stars

One December evening I climbed up to the mottai-madi, the bare terrace atop my parents’ four-floor apartment building in Chennai and waited for darkness to descend. The sun still hung low—an orange-red orb in the distance. Overhead, rose-ringed parakeets zipped towards their nightly roosts, squawking...