INDIAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE CULTIVATION OF SCIENCE

The Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS) is a public, deemed, research university in Jadavpur, South Kolkata, established on 29 July 1876 by Mahendralal Sarkar, a private medical practitioner. It is India's oldest research institute, spread over 9.5 acres, and is currently developing a second, SMART campus at Baruipur, named after Syamaprasad Mukherjee, whose foundation stone was laid in 2018. IACS operates under the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India, and focuses on fundamental research in physical, chemical, biological, mathematical, computational, and materials sciences, as well as applied and interdisciplinary areas. Since 2018, after being declared a deemed university, its academic work has been organized into six schools: Applied and Interdisciplinary Sciences, Biological Sciences, Chemical Sciences, Materials Sciences, Mathematical and Computational Sciences, and Physical Sciences, along with several specialized research centres. IACS also publishes the Indian Journal of Physics, founded in 1926. Historically, the institution was headed by a President, a role once held by the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, and later by notable scientists such as Meghnad Saha and Satyendra Nath Bose. Notable associates include Nobel laureate Sir C. V. Raman and Bharat Ratna recipient C.N.R. Rao.