IIT Jodhpur launches initiative to conserve, restore Thar Desert

The initiative aims to conserve the minerals and medicines, flora and fauna found in the Thar desert. 

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Jodhpur has launched Thar Desert Ecosystem Sciences Guided by Nature and Selection (DESIGNS), an initiative to conserve and restore the Thar desert. 

Launched under the aegis of the Jodhpur City Knowledge and Innovation Cluster (JCKIC), the initiative aims to conserve the minerals and medicines, flora, and fauna found in the Thar desert by carrying out ecosystem phenomics through the transdisciplinary framework of medical, engineering, environmental, and life sciences.  

Thar, is a hot desert, unique to the Indian subcontinent and is characterised by high maximum temperature with large diurnal variations, scanty rainfall, extreme aridity, and intense UV radiations. This has been one of the largest natural laboratories for evolving innovative ‘designs’ that, ensures adaptation and survival of its constituent species, their interdependencies and the conservation of the entire ecosystem. 

Often considered as wastelands, deserts are crucial for stabilisation of climate. Any shift in climate changecan lead to maladaptations for organisms who live at the ebb of physiological extremes, loss of diversity and ultimately an ecosystem collapse. To address this, the JCKIC has brought together organisations from the engineering, space research, medical, agricultural, zoological, and forestry who have carried out focused efforts in tackling diverse aspects of the Thar desert in an integrative framework  

Under the initiative, researchers will use IOT enabled devices and big data analytics framework to crowd source observations from the local ecosystem to the regional level keeping the cultural context and traditional medicine knowledge in perspective. This knowledge generation will result in providing a ‘Desert Ecosystem Knowledge Grid’ that could foster the cycle of engineering- research-development-commercialisation.  

This data grid will be helpful in finding solutions for management of diseases common and endemic to desert regions, novel bioprospecting opportunities and innovative bio-inspired engineering designs. 

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