Krishnaswamy Vijay Raghavan did his BTech (Chemical Engineering) and MTech degrees from IIT Kanpur, and PhD (Molecular Biology) from Bombay University while working at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). Thereafter, he was Research Fellow and Senior Research Fellow at the California Institute of Technology, USA. He has been working as Professor in the area of Developmental Genetics at the National Centre of Biological Sciences (NCBS), TIFR. Presently, he is Senior Professor and Director of the NCBS.

Academic and Research Achievements: Vijay Raghavan's research group has examined the development of muscles and the nervous system using the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster as a model system. His group has contributed substantially to our understanding of the molecular and cellular steps in the development of flight muscle. The current interests of his group are centered round how the construction of neural networks during development results in the capacity for coordinated locomotion.

Other Contributions: In collaboration with several colleagues, Professor Vijay Raghavan was involved in the establishment of NCBS.

Awards and Honours: Professor Vijay Raghavan received the Distinguished Alumnus Award of IIT Kanpur, SS Bhatnagar Award, JC Bose Fellowship, and the Jawaharlal Nehru Lecture Award (2008). He was elected Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore, National Academy of Science (India), Allahabad; and Foreign Associate of the European Molecular Biology Organization.