washington in jules vernes fictional odyssey journey to the center of the earth prof lidenbrock and his nephew axel descent into a volcano in iceland to explore the innards of our planet in real life however understanding the earth has never been a core issue even as mankind seeks answers to cosmic questions in seeking to offset the shortcoming an international partnership of scientists and research institutions on wednesday named indiaborn geoscientist manik talwani to head a multibillion dollar programme called the integrated ocean drilling program the project described as the largest most ambitious geoscience venture ever undertaken aims to explore the evolution and structure of the earth unlike prof lidenbrock dr talwani wont be popping inside a volcano instead he will oversee work on two stateofart ships that will sail the world and sink its drills into the ocean floor at different sites to come up with answers on everything from continent formations to how oceans developed the lead agencies in the project are the united states national science foundation and the japanese ministry of education culture sport science and technology in fact the lead vessel a 600million japanese drill ship named chikyu meaning the earth is still being built ahead of the mission beginning 2004 the other ship will be a us vessel called joides resolution dr talwani is an alumnus of delhi university and is currently a tenure track schlumberger professor of geophysics at houstons rice university where there was much celebration yesterday at the prestigious announcement maniks appointment is testament not only to the groundbreaking work he has been doing in earth sciences but also to his proven leadership over the years in publicprivate research partnerships said rice president malcolm gillis he is an exemplary choice for a position of such international scope dr talwani himself had reason to be doubly pleased he also became a grandfather on wednesday in an interview from houston he told this correspondent he looked forward to contributing to the understanding of how continents and oceans evolved even though he joked it is going to take me away from the comforts of homethe distinguished geoscientist left his own native home india in the early 1950s following an ms in physics from delhi university he later earned a doctorate from columbia university where he served as professor of geophysics and was director of columbias lamontdoherty geological observatory from 1973 to 1981 he left lamont for gulf oil company where he served first as director of the center for crustal studies and later as chief scientist when chevron acquired gulf in 1985 he moved to rice and simultaneously founded the geotechnology research institute at the houston advanced research center where he served as director until 1998 among the many honors he has been decorated with is nasas exceptional scientific achievement award for sending the first gravimeter to the moondr talwanis one regret though is that india has turned down an invitation to join the iodp mission he said feelers had been sent to