I am a naturalist interested in all creatures great and small. Pokémon was perhaps the greatest inspiration during my childhood which drew me toward plants and animals! In Bangalore, rare though it is, there is a reserve forest right next to my school, which I spent a lot of time exploring. Taking great joy in the oddest of things that the forest could offer from tiny lantana fruits and self-burial grass seeds to scary spiders and mongooses. I continued this in high school and started butterfly-watching during my bachelor's (I can still identify more Pokémon than butterflies, XD). In my master's, I got to study the visual pathway in bird brains, which then piqued my interest in neuroscience. I then decided to go down a path that combines two of my interests, insects and neurobiology.Currently, I am a graduate student at the Insect Flight Lab, National Center for Biological Sciences, Bangalore working on a project where I study the jumping strategies across insects and study how they control their jumps.

Check out my website https://www.southerndragon.in