India, Feb. 3 -- Indian-origin climate scientist Veerabhadran Ramanathan has been awarded the 2026 Crafoord Prize in Geosciences by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Often described as the "Nobel of Geosciences," the prize recognises Ramanathan's decades of research on super-pollutants and atmospheric brown clouds, which have reshaped understanding of global warming.

Ramanathan, 82, made a landmark discovery in 1975 while working at NASA: chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), widely used in aerosols and refrigeration, trap heat in the atmosphere up to 10,000 times more effectively than carbon dioxide. "Until 1975, we thought global warming was mainly from CO,. I was shocked at the capacity of technology and human beings to change the environm...