Navigating the spaceship of life: Jaykumar Vaidya’s interstellar journey from Mumbai's slums to NASA.

Jaykumar’s fascination with space began with intriguing movies on aliens and extra-terrestrial bodies. To satiate his curiosity, his younger self was determined to become a scientist and do whatever it takes to realise this dream. As he grew up, he faced challenges and hardships of all kinds but whenever life gave him lemons, he made sure to turn them into interesting science experiments.

Tune in as we take the road less travelled to space with Jaykumar Vaidya and listen to his inspiring journey which he overcame with zeal to realise his passion and make it to NASA.

Transcript

Go-Beyond Podcast Transcript: Jaykumar Vaidya

Speakers:

Akshay Kapur

Jaykumar Vaidya

Akshay Kapur

Welcome to the Sony Pictures Networks Go Beyond Podcast where we travel the galaxies to share stories of the extraordinary. I'm your launch assistant Akshay Kapur, in many ways the journey of our guest today is akin to that of a space rocket for one he is no stranger to the concept of escape velocity. The rocket fuel was ignited when he developed a deep passion for science at a young age. The structural system was built with an electrical engineering degree from KJ Somaiya college and bolted with a Master’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Virginia the guidance system was his participation in several state of the art research programs. All of these components combined enabled him to land a position at NASA which one might argue is light years away from where his journey began in Mumbai's Kurla district. Today his work at NASA's planetary environments lab not only helps humanity expand its boundaries of knowledge, but also perhaps helps us understand our place in the universe. It's a distinct honour to have with us Jaykumar Vaidya on the Go Beyond Podcast, Jay welcome to the podcast. How are you feeling this morning?

Jaykumar Vaidya

Thanks Akshay. Ah I'm good just getting ready to work.

Akshay Kapur

I think at the age of 25 Jay, you're making strides in the world of science. But I would love to take us back to the metaphorical big bang of your journey. What got you into science and what motivated you to study and pursue your academics?

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, first things first I'm not 25, I'm 27. Actually I had passion for science even when I was in school I was passionate to actually be a scientist and I didn't know what to do for that. I was too young for understanding the journey of what it takes to become a scientist and the passion of actually getting into science was due to some remote control cars or some broken electronics, like in my home there was a broken TV and whenever I used to see that I just don't know what to do to repair this and I started just at that time asking around and thinking that maybe this is not really science, because this is just getting things working and any electrician can do that. So, I was really interested in knowing how does one get there like is there a degree that you need to pursue? And then over the time asking around because at that time I don't remember I even had a laptop or a phone until the next ten years.

Akshay Kapur

Right

Jaykumar Vaidya

So I just asked people and then sometimes I heard okay, you need to do this you need to do that eventually, I understood that either I need a research degree in masters, in a particular field or I need a PhD. But I wasn't really committed to like go beyond even class 10, due to  many issues but my passion started looking at things around and what does it take to become a scientist so I was really curious.

Akshay Kapur

That's fantastic I think one thing that's standing out to me is curiosity and problem solving as sort of the themes and in what you've just told us do you feel like these have always been, traits that have been part of your personality growing up or this is something that maybe you were inspired to develop over the years from an external source?

Jaykumar Vaidya

No, actually the second thing that you told which is critical problem thinking and solving is something that I had even from school days and that's because whenever I see a problem and even LHS equal to RHS in simple math and I'm not convinced with that. I will go and talk to teacher even if it's correct I'm just not clear about why something is the way it is, and I need to know the reason why you need to do that and if it is really necessary to do that. 

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, I was really curious as well as when I see a problem, I need to actually solve it without that I really don't feel peace.

Akshay Kapur

I Think that's fantastic and the desire to answer the question why, is probably one of the core requisites for any research scientist I would assume. Speaking of curiosity and problem solving I think it's very clear that it's probably linked to what you do at NASA but could you tell us a little bit about the project you are working on at NASA and what your role in that project is and what is the quote unquote problem that you are trying to solve?

Jaykumar Vaidya

So um I'll give you just a big picture which is as of now we are building some instruments called mass spectrometers and those instruments when they fly to a planet or to a different satellite we want to measure the constituents of air in this project like in our case at earth, air consists of 78% nitrogen 21% oxygen and I think 0.93 % of argon so we want to see what is there in the air or atmosphere of a planet and that could be any planet that we consider, right now I'm working on a spacecraft which is surrounding Mars.

It's called Maven and it was already launched, I just am doing some data analysis of that and I will be working on some other spacecrafts. I have already started working but the main gist of all these projects is to see the presence of either new constituents or which are the elements which are already existing in the periodic table and in what proportion they are.

So, we build such instruments and we send it to space once it actually sets in the orbits we keep analysing the data, sending commands and my job is to actually not just build the electrical part of the instrument but also the transmission and reception of the packets and the software and what it takes to decode the information that we get from the packet.

Akshay Kapur

That's fantastic! and just to set a bit of a context for our listeners who may not so familiar with some of the technical terminology, and also with the end goals of such missions. Could you tell us for a layperson, what is the end goal of such a mission? How does someone who's not inclined towards science understand the importance or the impact that such a mission will have?

Jaykumar Vaidya

Yeah, so for example on earth. The main reason our breathing would be because of oxygen. We inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide right? If we want to think like it on Mars and colonise Mars, we should be having enough amount of oxygen for us to be surviving there unless we evolve as a human being to not take oxygen right? 

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs) Right. That's a few million years away.

Jaykumar Vaidya

Or maybe not, we never know. In the case of Covid maybe we able to be immune. So, there are many possibilities in this case if we are able to find a similar environment as earth on Mars or some other planet then we do have a possibility of having humans, evolved there that is one of the reasons. The other reason is also to see if there is already life existing there, of course we have got some evidence that there may have been some life there due to the presence of water, but we want to see who else is there apart from us in this solar system. 

Akshay Kapur

Right. Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, these are few of the things that we are curious about and mainly the reason is if we can replicate a similar environment as Earth on some other planet. So, if it already exists, we need to know which planet it is in our solar system. 

Akshay Kapur

Right? That makes sense taking a step back though over here Jay, I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about your journey from Mumbai to NASA, so where did it begin and what do you feel were some of the key milestones along the way that helped you get to where you are today?

Jaykumar Vaidya

Sure, so it's pretty difficult to actually tell where I began because I myself don't really realize that a point was the beginning point. One thing led to another, and I was really determined for wanting something and when someone is determined you would do whatever it takes to get there despite any obstacles that you face. For example, my journey began when my grandmother passed away. 

I wasn't really knowing of the hardships and difficulties my mom was facing, one thing that I'm really fortunate is my mother was transparent to me and it's just that I didn't really see that as a child. I didn't think that I would need to see such a thing or those hardships and struggles and the issues. My journey from there to here has been very different and not conventional. Things was really difficult, when my grandmother passed away and I was doubting everything, regretting my life.

So, accepting helped me a lot. When I accepted that this is the way it is, and I need to just fight back, and I don't want to give up because my mother didn't give up and it's really shameful if I do. I was actually wanting to give up, but I didn't. I was going to drop out of the school, but my mom pushed me and I'm really fortunate for actually having that event come, that I didn't drop out and I went to junior college with science. 

My mom didn't like that, and I knew that science is the only way that I would enjoy whatever I do, and I didn't have any money and let alone the school fees or anything that I'm dreaming of so had to build a pyramid from scratch. I and my mom used to sit and figure out things and work and apply for scholarships. We knew one thing that we cannot rely on anybody except ourselves, So I used to mainly focus on getting funds and see what to do next. It's really scary you know going to school and to not have a confidence that maybe I will not be able to go to school next month or next term right? When it comes to junior college, it's even scarier because the fees are high.

And when it comes to engineering, paying lakhs and lakhs of fees let's say you go to first year you accumulate funds, scholarships, and you drop out because not having a fees, or even second year or third year so it was damn scary at that time.

Akshay Kapur

Right. My next question because you earlier mentioned the word big picture while answering another question of mine, I thought I can start there and ask you, through all of this what I would call the metaphorical asteroid belts of your early years. What big picture was in your mind and what big picture did you sort of keep aspirationally, with you to work towards in order to escape this situation?

Jaykumar Vaidya

So big picture was I want to be able to make my mom really proud and wanted to be able to have a better life like my mom wanted me to. So, I wanted to give her eventual final product of me which is successful which she can be proud of so my big picture was to actually make her believe in me and then be proud of what she did. She didn't choose a wrong decision because my father had asked to get me in custody, but she didn't give me, and I think she is.

Akshay Kapur

I think that actually leads us very clearly into the next point which you've highlighted even earlier on in this conversation that the idea of distractions one challenge that we all have to face at some point in our lives is how to stay focused on a task, a job, a vision and not get deterred by distractions that we face and on a daily basis. Could you tell us about some of the distractions that you faced? I think you've actually highlighted quite a few already But also how you overcame them what were your strategies to overcoming the distractions that you faced along the way?

Jaykumar Vaidya

So honestly, I had to change myself and I'm glad that I did. You want to be focused on your goal and my mom was the person who was focused and is she still focused which is not letting other people affect her too much. But I think that was not there in me. I was getting affected by other people. I learned it partly from my mom, partly from some of my friends or colleagues you can say but letting others affect or control your actions, right? Is not something that you would want if you want to be focused. 

Akshay Kapur

I think what you said definitely alludes to in many ways your journey has almost been like navigating through the vast open void of space. You had to kind of find your own way since your school days even in the absence of a mentor or any resources to guide you. So, one of the things that I am definitely curious about I'm sure that listeners are also curious about is what kind of habits skills and qualities served as your guidance system during these times.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, habits were actually being consistent which is what I follow even now. Being consistent in what you want to do is good for a longer time. You may deal with it now. It will keep coming and I think it will keep coming when you go to achieve something several times right? So if you are consistent enough to of course deal with the distractions, stay focused be productive in what you want that comes from consistency so one of the thing during this journey or habit that I made was being consistent giving equal time for all the things that I want to do or give proportional time for other things which are not happening and give more efforts and time in there. And being consistent helped me.

Akshay Kapur

Right. Taking a step away from the train of conversation here Jay, a large part of your responsibilities at NASA as we refer to at the start of this conversation involve critical problem solving and sometimes one needs to take a pause and refresh their minds and then come back to a problem at hand to figure out a solution. Many famous scientists and inventors have had their breakthroughs in their dream states, for example, have you ever had such an experience and if not what is your go-to technique for keeping your mind malleable for creative problem solving on the projects you work on?

Jaykumar Vaidya

I think what you're referring to having some successes due to dream state. I think my go to is discussing, if I don't get the solution myself, I learn how other people do it discussing with the group, discussing with the team and exploring if anybody would have a little knowledge that would help me to orient myself in the right direction towards approaching a solution.

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

And if not then yeah, so keep figuring it out. Learn because that's what one of the things that researchers would do, read the literature what is tried already in the field and if it's really really new then see what is cross-platform in other words you would be able to have some help from some other field and you may apply some techniques from other field to your field and you would be first person to do that.

Akshay Kapur

In a situation like this How do you avoid falling into the trap of the observation bias?

Jaykumar Vaidya

Yeah, I mean that is a very important part of a researcher’s journey, for example, my first paper in the US, I was trying to look for something and I eventually made some other research. 

So, my hypothesis was to solve one of the graphs to solve one of the computing paradigm problems and the circuit that I had made was supposed to solve that problem according to my calculations and hypothesis, but it didn't really do, and I was looking and it was being consistently solving a kind of a problem I looked up in the literature and that was another computing paradigm problem. So, when I looked at it carefully it was not doing something that is expected and that was solving one of the problems with a behaviour of noise which is generally prone to be, bad for electronic circuits but what it did to my circuit is noise was helping or aiding the synchronization between the electrical elements of my circuit and so how can I use that disturbance right? Which is generally a thing that anybody would want to avoid how can I use it in turn to be helping my circuit if I can save energy based on the noise or surrounding noise circuit noise. So that's what I did.

I published the paper which shows that due to the noise around the circuit on chip I can solve some of the problems.

Akshay Kapur

That's fantastic and speaking of scientific research and especially scientific space research I feel, a lot of the stuff that you're working on Jay is at the forefront of ground-breaking research in the world today. Talking about the Maven mission we also have heard a little bit about the Artemis missions and of course then there's the James Webb Telescope.

With all these sorts of avenues of research and looking at the vast subject of science today. Even if it's something that you're not directly working on, I thought we could ask you is there one question in the world of science that you wish is answered in your lifetime and what would that be and why?

Jaykumar Vaidya

I would like to understand many things, but I will tell you one of the many things. That has  always bring a new kind of curiosity in me which is if we can understand what is going around us is real for example, the world that we are living in I just don't know if it is meant to be the way it is or can you really change what you are going to do in the future meaning is there something like destiny is there something that you can really tweak in your journey? Is it a simulation that you are running it?

Akshay Kapur

(Laughs), Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

You can rewrite your destiny but unless and until you go back in time, or you go forward you cannot verify that can you? 

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, you need to verify if whatever is happening around us is it real or are we living in a simulation and what if like I wake up some time or maybe it's a dream I just don't know. So, I'm curious to know how these things can turn out to be and I think it is somewhere related to brain also maybe something I'm thinking is real is not really real and the curiosity about brain and curiosity about what is real and what is not how to draw a line between that I just haven't got a really clear picture regarding the same.

Akshay Kapur

Absolutely and I don't know if you're a Marvel fan, but unfortunately, we don't have a reality stone which we can use to snap our fingers and answer these questions but I definitely 

Jaykumar Vaidya

Um, yeah.

Akshay Kapur

I definitely think that understanding the boundaries of reality is something that is constantly changing based on human philosophy and scientific research. So, it's a question that personally I would also be fascinated to see the answer to.

Was your inspiration for science because you grew up watching maybe any sci-fi shows or because you ah grew up on any pop culture that leaned you towards science or were there any famous individuals in in the fields of science that inspired you to pursue that career path or that path of education?

Jaykumar Vaidya

So that's a really good question and one of the motivations for me to become scientist you can say and also very much interested in space was a Indian movie starring Hrithik Roshan, Koi Mil Gaya and I didn't know what are aliens honestly before that and that is a movie I thought like okay so this is just something that could be existing and you know like there can be other people. There can be other bodies who are looking for us or we are looking for them and where do they come from?

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

it was one of the things which made me aware of aliens and then onwards my curiosity for space started more I used to read just in general some websites I think when I was in junior college I used to read some blogs and some websites to actually see what exactly I was thinking and what exactly scientists are thinking and learn from what their observations are and be even more curious that what happens beyond the solar system, so I was curious about such things. Though I didn't know anything about how do you get there and about NASA I didn't envision or I didn't see myself to work at NASA or even like other institutes like TIFR right?  It like at that time it was the best thing to do, I think.

Like for example since I came to the US I was working as a researcher in the University of Virginia and because there was some overlap with one of the projects being funded at NASA, I got an opportunity to work there. I think the curiosity for being a tech enthusiast or being very open to what exists in space, and I also wanted a degree astrophysics.

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, I had been even thinking of like should I be getting a PhD in astrophysics or like somewhere around the space institute here in the US but that was the main motivation, that movie was actually the beginning.

Akshay Kapur:

I think we've come towards the end of our conversation today Jay but before we end our conversation, I think there's something that we definitely need to ask you so just to sort of set the context you have overcome struggles and navigated unknown terrain both professionally and personally in the absence of a guiding hand. So, this final question I would like for you to treat it as one that would potentially become a resource for future generations near or far who may aspire towards a big picture but don't know how to get there. What message or learnings from your journey would you like to share with them to help them find their way?

(laughs) Or if you allow me a slight pun here, what packets of information would you like leave behind for them to help them find their way?

Jaykumar Vaidya

Yeah, good way to frame that. So, in my opinion the message that I would give to the audience or people who are listening is I think you should be open minded enough just because some things worked for your elders, or some things work for you doesn't mean it would work for other people like others advice. 

Even my advice may not work but may not necessarily apply to all other people right? But some transferable skills are something that I would like to encourage people having like consistency, determined approach, feedback mechanism which helps you to understand if what you're doing is really going on track or are you just fooling yourself and I understand these are abstract ideas, but I think these are the ones could turn out to be transferable ideas from field-to-field person to person. When you make these plans you need to be open-minded enough to actually see where best you can or how much near you can go towards the goal you want. You may not be able to go exactly where you want, but maybe there is some other way to go there right? 

So, you should be open minded enough to think that there can be multiple ways to get to the place you want to go but just because my elders have suggested that or my colleagues or my boss have suggested, that is the only way or that is the best way to go ahead. You need to be always questioning what you do is the 100 % sure short correct thing. There may exist better things or better ways. 

So, questioning yourself I think is really important and also questioning others when they do something wrong, or you think that they may have done better because of some things.

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So self-feedback mechanism and questioning is something that I would, give advice to other people.

Akshay Kapur

I think you've answered that question and you've left some very important pearls of information here. Could you maybe give us a short example of the feedback mechanism that you use and maybe someone can use that as sort of a template, can then assess their own journeys and see if that feedback mechanism works for them to assess whether they're working towards the goals they actually have.

Jaykumar Vaidya

Sure, so in the case like I'm working on a project, and I want to achieve a goal right? and there are some steps in implementing the project and there are also explanations and reasons why these are the steps. But while working out with those things there can be bugs right in those journey or if you are a computer engineer or a software engineer you will see that simple libraries that you want to install may give you errors and why would that be because maybe your platform is different. Maybe you are having some missing libraries already and that means what is working with other people on Stack Workflow may not work with you. So, what is working in the project or similar missions may not be working with you and the feedback that I take is what is the project trying to tell me when you do an experiment a failed experiment can teach you a couple of things. When I have a failed experiment or a failed um part of the project, I make a detailed note of it and see what exactly is wrong or try to see what could have been better to not have this particular issue.

So the feedback is when you have a failed experiment you learn from even that and similarly in life I have some failed things like I had set goals and I couldn't achieve that and I learned from it why that would have been the case is it because of societal norms, is it because of my own barriers is it because of my incompetency or is it because of some other reasons and see how can I tackle each and every problem because I think if you work on problems that you face or your failures you are still better than not doing anything and just sitting there or maybe going to another project right? So, like going one step forward, not necessarily reaching towards success but wanting to do what you do in a way that you feel is like you are progressing one step at a time and maybe who knows you will invent something else, or you will finish another goal in life.

Akshay Kapur

Right.

Jaykumar Vaidya

So, I think taking feedback from every failure and understanding what went wrong and what could have been right during the things that you were doing in life is something that I would encourage people having.

Akshay Kapur

Fantastic! With that Jay I think we've come to the close of our conversation today. But I must say it's been an extremely enjoyable conversation and eye-opening conversation and I'm sure our listeners will really enjoy learning from your journey. Thank you so much for your time and for taking the time to join us on the Go-Beyond podcast.

Jaykumar Vaidya

Sure, Thank you so much Akshay.

~ ends ~