History

WINStep Forward (WSF) is a nonprofit based in Madison, WI with a mission to build a bridge between the United States and India through research, science and technology.

WSF was founded by Dr. Aseem Ansari, Professor of Chemical Genomics and Synthetic Biology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2014. WSF is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) agency organized under the laws of the State of Wisconsin. The inspiration sparked after Dr. Ansari spent some time on his managing the Khorana and SN Bose Scholar Exchange Programs, and saw the potential for reaching greater heights with more people working to help develop the programs. With the support through partnership with the Government of India (Department of Biotechnology -DBT and Science and Engineering Research Board -SERB) and Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF),WSF Forward was born.

Growth of WINStep

Since its inception, WSF has grown from only managing Scholar Exchange Programs to initiating a new training program called “Technology Transfer,” to partnering with Indian Organizations focusing on agricultural sciences in a movement referred to “Rural Development,” and head starting Sci-ROI, a nonprofit that promotes science and technology between India and the USA amongst post PhD graduates and policy makers in India. TheWSF Forward Team is a small, dedicated group of members.

Scholar Programs

• Recruit top Indian students in STEM fields and place them in research internships at U.S. universities for a period of 10-12 weeks, providing travel and stipends to scholars
• Over 5,000 applications are received each year making the final students selected among the top 1.5% of the best scholars across India and the US
• There is also an opportunity for US students to travel to India for research
• Goal is to nurture talent and create a community of scientists, engineers and technology leaders between US and India

The programs are named in honor of Professor Har Gobind Khorana, a pioneer chemical biologist, who shared the 1968 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine at University of Wisconsin-Madison for helping decipher the genetic code and for developing methods for nucleic acid synthesis and Professor Satyendra Nath Bose, a visionary Indian physicist best known for his work on quantum mechanics and postulation of the Boson in the early 1920s.

Khorana

• Founded in 2007, by UW Professors Aseem Ansari and Ken Shapiro
• Honors Har Gobind Khorana, the Indian-born scientist whose received a Nobel Prize Khorana
• For students in fields of biology, biochemistry, and biotechnology are encouraged to apply
• Receives generous support from the Government of India’s Department of Biotechnology, the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum, and WINStep Forward
• Goal is to long-term R&D linkages and collaborations across disciplines, cultures and geographical boundaries

SN Bose

• The S.N. Bose Program was a natural extension of the Khorana Program
• Promote fellowships in not only biotechnology but all Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, as well as Medicine, Pharma, Agriculture, Wild Life and Climate Change
• The program is named in honor of Satyendra Nath Bose (1894 – 1974), a visionary Indian physicist best known for his work on quantum mechanics in the early 1920s. The class of particles that obey Bose-Einstein statistics, Bosons, was named after him.