SPARKS: Scholars Pursuing Advanced Research in Computer Science

The Department of Computer Science and Automation (CSA), Indian Institute of Science is soliciting applications for Scholars Pursuing Advanced Research in Computer Science (SPARKS) programme for October 2025.

  • The SPARKS program is open to bright and motivated people pursuing/completed Bachelor’s (B.E./B.Tech/B.Stat/B.Math/B.Sc or equivalent) or Master’s (M.E./M.Tech/M.Stat/M.Sc or equivalent) in CS/ECE/EE/Maths or equivalent programme.
  • Each scholar will be engaged with a faculty member of CSA. The expected duration of the engagement is minimum 4 months and may vary with the requirement from the respective faculty member.
  • The last date for applying is 30th September 2025. Results will be announced by 15th October 2025. Interested candidates should apply for this program by clicking here.
  • Emoluments will be provided as per institute norms.
  • Below are the list of project topics
    1. Visualization in oceanography, geometric and topological analysis of granular materials. (Prof. Vijay Natarajan)
    2. Architecture aware optimizations for machine learning models to improve inference performance (Prof. R Govindarajan & Prof. Chiranjib Bhattacharyya)
    3. Automated safety checking of power substation control software using machine learning and program analysis (Prof. K V Raghavan)
    4. Approximation/Online Algorithms and Computational Geometry (Prof. Arindam Khan)
    5. Quantum-Safe hybrid TLS protocol (Prof. Sanjit Chatterjee)
    6. Identity-based key exchange (Prof. Sanjit Chatterjee)
    7. Multiparty Computation, Rational Cryptography, Consensus (Prof. Arpita Patra)
    8. Reliable Policy Iteration for Scalable Reinforcement Learning (Prof. Gugan Thoppe & Prof. Aditya Gopalan)
    9. Reinforcement learning for Distributed Blockchains (Prof. Gugan Thoppe & Prof. Yogesh Simhan)

Two recommendation letters for the applicant from faculty (or someone working in similar position) where the applicant is currently affiliated are mandatory. Applicants will have to submit the official email id of the recommenders, and we will send requests directly to the recommenders for the shortlisted candidates. All information (e.g., GPA/percentages) entered in your application is subject to verification, and offers will be made to shortlisted candidates only after such verification.

The applications will be reviewed by a committee of faculty members at CSA, and the selected candidates will be informed of their selection by 15th October 2025, and the list will also be posted on this page. The decision of the selection committee will be final and no correspondence in this regard will be entertained.

Selected applicants in the previous cycle are

  • Chirag Kumar
  • Subham Patra
  • Padmapriya S
  • Deep Kumar Ganguly
  • Ananyabrata Barua
  • Aniruddha Mukherjee
  • Himakant Sharma
  • Sudarshan Senthil

FAQ

SPARKS is not a short-term internship but rather meant to be an intensive research project spanning a few months to a year and that students currently enrolled in degree programs with commitments in the next few months will not be considered. They can apply once they have finished their degree commitments.