My Story

2000 – 2013 · Autopilot Mode

I was nine years old when I realized my fascination with space sciences. Looking up at the Moon from my balcony in New Delhi, reading about Mars’s polar ice caps in the newspaper, flipping through encyclopedias. Life in India was simple and steady. School, family dinners, daily cricket time with friends in the streets. I was born and raised in New Delhi until I was 13, in a time that felt safe and predictable.

2013 – 2018 · Immigrant. Surviving. Adapting.

October 31, 2013; a chilly Halloween night. My family, my grandfather who came to pick us up (Nanu, hindi term for my mom’s father), and I took a $50 yellow taxi ride from JFK airport to my grandparents’ two-bedroom apartment near Jackson Heights, Queens. For the next few months, my sister and I slept on the floor while my parents searched for jobs and figured out how to rebuild life from scratch.

That period shaped my foundational elements: work ethic, adaptability, and kind of resilience that only comes from growing up faster than you expect to.

In high school, I poured myself into everything: academics, leadership, volunteering, and summer jobs. Because I knew education was the only ticket forward. All the late nights and extra courses paid off when I earned the Posse Foundation Full-Tuition Leadership Scholarship, which opened the door to Wheaton College Massachusetts. By then, my parents had regained enough stability to support my housing costs. A major privilege.

2018 – 2022 · Reigniting Space Sciences

I entered Wheaton as a pre-med student with plans to become a surgeon. The practical dream of many immigrant kids, especially the ‘brownies’ (a term for brown immigrants). But life had other plans.

After taking a few astronomy courses, I joined a research project mapping geologic features on Enceladus, one of Saturn’s icy moons. It was fascinating… and also a little monotonous. So I pivoted to an astronomy project, then a biology lab. Both valuable, but neither quite right.

Then I took Astrobiology, and things began clicking a bit more. I began applying organic chemistry to the chemistry of other worlds. And that childhood interest for space sciences found a new outlet: potential for life beyond Earth.

Every project, even the ones I left behind, taught me something essential. None of it was wasted time. It was all part of the realignment toward what felt more meaningful.

2022 – 2024 · Stability vs. Alignment

After graduating summa cum laude, I joined Epic Systems, working on the Beacon Oncology team to develop healthcare software. It was a stable, well-paying job that made my family proud and allowed me to grow technically and professionally.

I also got to move out of my parents’ place and start a new adventure hundreds of miles away from all my friends and family. Another period of self-reflection and understanding myself, in a way I never got to before.

The job and the experience was truly one of a kind. But it was stressful. Long hours, demanding projects, constant pressure. I was good at it, but I was living in a perpetual state of stress and survival. And I just could not get rid of my inclination towards space.

So I took a leap that didn’t make sense on paper. I left comfort behind to return to curiosity. To pursue the questions that had always guided me: How does life begin? What makes a world habitable? What connects chemistry to consciousness?

Hence, began my journey to graduate school.

2024 – Present · Coming Full Circle

Before starting graduate school, I received the CASSUM fellowship to work with Dr. Martin Rahm at Chalmers University in Sweden. There, I studied how non-carbon-based polymers could exist in Venus’s sulfuric-acid clouds. A bold question that challenges our Earth-centered definition of life.

Soon after, I began my PhD in Planetary Science and Astrobiology at Purdue University, where I now study prebiotic chemistry and model how life’s building blocks might form on worlds like Titan. My work blends chemistry, computation, and curiosity into one pursuit: understanding how the universe creates life.

Other Endeavors

Alongside research, I started sharing my journey online through @scient_ish, where I make complex space science topics accessible, and @spiritualish_, where I talk about purpose, growth, and alignment. Over time, I’ve realized the two aren’t separate. Science and spirituality are just different ways of exploring truth.

To me, science is how we understand the universe. Spirituality is how we understand ourselves within it.
And both matter equally.

What I’ve learned

Looking back, every phase of my life (India, immigrating, college pivots, corporate work, and now research) has felt like a recalibration toward some alignment.

Success ≠ achievement.
Success = pure intentions + effort + patience

Every experience is an opportunity for self-discovery. And in such a path, no effort is ever wasted.

Not sure what will come after the PhD yet… and that uncertainty is part of the magic of life. Endless Possibilities :)

With love and gratitude,
Ishaan