Host Institution USA: Indian Institute of Technology-Kharagpur

Shouraseni Roy

Prof. Shouraseni Roy is a professor in the Department of Geography and Sustainable Development at the University of Miami. Her research centers on long-term climate trends and their societal impacts, with a particular focus on the intersections of climate change, health, and gender in the Global South. Over the past two decades, she has gained national and international recognition for her contributions to climate science, which reflects in her selection as a contributor to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.

Her methodological research approach emphasizes spatial analysis using GIS, remote sensing, and climate data. She analyzes field data, satellite imagery, and both gridded and station-level data sets to identify urban heat island trends in cities like New Delhi, Belize, and Beijing. Her research has been published in leading journals like the International Journal of Climatology, Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, and Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres. As a recognized expert on Indian climate, she has also contributed an entry on Monsoons to the Encyclopedia of Geography published by the American Association of Geographers (AAG). Several of her publications on long-term climate change have been cited in IPCC reports. Prof. Roy was also selected as an AAG delegate to attend the UNFCCC’s Conference of Parties (COP) meetings in Lima and Paris. Earlier, she had conducted a Fulbright study in India on the long-term impact of urbanization on groundwater levels in Delhi and Mumbai.

Besides her climate-related research, Prof. Roy has actively engaged in projects that examine urban processes using big data and geospatial analysis. Her recent work in Miami, conducted in collaboration with students and faculty, explored spatial patterns of crime, traffic accidents, and vulnerability to sea-level rise.

Prof. Roy’s Fulbright-Kalam project is documenting the localized impacts of climate change in the Sundarban Delta through comprehensive spatial analysis and fieldwork. The study is assessing shoreline changes, subsidence, and local adaptation responses in order to provide critical insights for policymakers and local communities. The results will be shared with local stakeholders and used to develop a knowledge hub dashboard for collaborations.

Saikat Talapatra

Dr. Saikat Talapatra is a professor and director of the School of Physics and Applied Physics at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. He obtained his BSc degree in physics and BEd from RIE Bhubaneswar, India, and MSc in physics from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. Thereafter, he graduated from the Department of Physics at Southern Illinois University with an MS in physics and a PhD in engineering science. He worked as a postdoctoral scholar at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York, before returning to Southern Illinois University as a faculty. He is a condensed matter physicist/materials scientist, with research interests in the synthesis and characterization of a variety of nanoscale materials and structures materials for multiple applications related to electronics, energy, and environment.

Dr. Talapatra’s Fulbright-Nehru project is investigating the adsorptive surface properties of the porous carbon materials obtained from biowaste products in order to develop them for carbon dioxide capture and storage. The success of the project could lead to applications that are needed for a carbon neutral (net-zero) society.

Jerry Anthony

Dr. Jerry Anthony, PhD, FAICP, is a global changemaker. Anthony has a bachelor’s degree in Architecture, a master’s degree in Town Planning, and a PhD in Urban and Regional Planning. He is a tenured faculty member at the School of Planning and Public Affairs at the University of Iowa, a Carnegie-1 and AAU institution in the US

Dr. Anthony teaches courses in Sustainable Development, Housing Policy, Land Use Planning, Urban Growth Management, and International Planning. He has been named an Excellent Educator by the American Planning Association. He has been a Visiting Scholar at the Chinese University of Hong Kong from 2015-2019. He has won numerous teaching awards at the University of Iowa. Students consistently rate his courses very highly, regard him as an outstanding teacher, and describe his classes to be life-transforming.

Dr. Anthony’s research interests are in housing policy and land use planning in the US and international contexts. His current research projects include a) the effects of high housing costs on economic growth in the largest U.S. cities, b) the rebuilding of the American city of Cedar Rapids after a devasting flood, c) methods to increase the replacement of traditional wood-burning cookstoves (chulhas) in India, and d) climate change responsive urbanism in India. He was named a HUD Urban Scholar in 2002. His publications are widely read, with a 2004 paper titled “The Effects of Florida’s Growth Management Act on Housing Affordability” named one of the top 10 most influential papers published in the Journal of the American Planning Association in 25 years. His research has been funded by numerous entities, including the Brookings Institution, the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, and the US Department of Housing & Urban Development.

In 2003, he co-founded the Housing Trust Fund of Johnson County that to date has distributed about $12 million to help build over 900 reasonably-priced homes in Iowa. In 2019, Dr. Anthony was given the University of Iowa’s Michael J. Brody award for Excellence in Service.

In 2020, Dr. Anthony was named a Fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners – the highest honor for urban planners in the U.S.

Cities are significant contributors to greenhouse gas emissions and global warming. Fortunately, cities are better resourced financially than rural areas, bring together people with varied skills and are crucibles for innovation. These advantages could be combined to facilitate sustainable urbanism. Many scholars believe that the war to stave off catastrophic climate change will be won or lost in cities. Much of the world’s urban population lives in the global South, where cities are expanding rapidly. Modifying the development patterns of these cities while they are growing affords significant opportunities for a sustainable future for humankind. Dr. Anthony, in his Fulbright-Kalam project, plans to document the climate change mitigating efforts of several Indian cities, assessing their effectiveness, and exploring their transferability to cities in other countries.