Indian science is experiencing a boom right now, with the establishment of new institutes and funding like never before. However, science forms only 6-8% of the news in Indian media, with articles reproduced from international news agencies, or articles which are not articulated very well.

For the layperson, accessible science can make all the difference between a good decision and a bad one. At another level, well-presented science has a ‘wow’ factor, which appeals to the innate curiosity in human nature. Most science is funded by public money, and at some point, the research community has an obligation to tell the public how their money is being used. However, one cannot expect scientists to have the time and energy to do this, so therefore we are here – our endeavour is to make science as appealing to the layman as his daily dose of cricket.

Put very simply, a science journalist is someone who can communicate complex science to a lay audience. Such communication can hugely benefit the public and industries that depend on scientific knowhow. It can help government and non-government policy makers by keeping them better informed. It can even help scientists understand each other across fields, promote inter-disciplinary research and indirectly help them acquire funding for their research.

Further, with limited access to recent scientific developments, opportunities for innovation and translating some of the recent research also becomes a challenge. However, with effective dissemination of the latest scientific developments and research, the ‘time-to-market’ some of these can be reduced when multiple modes of communication are adopted.

One primary mode is writing scientific news as stories or press-releases. For this, it is crucial to identify and curate such relevant research, showcase them appropriately and facilitate translation of these. Often, scientists/researchers alone cannot translate research to the audience or the market, and it would require an interdisciplinary perspective of understanding the market to create the right product/service based on the research carried to, packaging, pricing, marketing, and such.

Recognising this need, Gubbi Labs has been working on communicating science, with the aim of bridging the gap between research institutes and the public, from whose money science is funded. The broader goal is to raise the bar of scientific literacy across the country.

As a starting point, we have been working with research institutions, facilitating dissemination of their published research by translating it into simple, crisp press releases which we send to the media. As a part of this, we successfully set up and operated the Science Media Center for the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) for four years. In the past few years, we spread our operations to other institutions, and started working closely with the media; a team has started regular podcasts too. We have named this science communication endeavour Research Matters.