Faculty /

Academic Details

• Associate Professor (September 2017), Physics, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Bhopal, India.
• Assistant Professor (May 2011 - August 2017) Physics, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Bhopal, India.
• Post doc: Chemical Physics Theory Group, Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
• PhD: (Soft-condensed Matter Physics), Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai – 600 036, India.

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Research

• Soft Condensed Matter Physics: Liquid Crystal, Rheology of Micellar Solution, Chemically Propelled Nanomotors, Active polymers.
• Self-propulsion of micron and nanoscale objects in the low Reynolds number regime is commonly observed in biological systems. Examples include molecular motors that undergo conformational changes that lead to directed motion on filaments to carry out active transport tasks in the cell. Motivated from nature the design and application of micro- and nanoscale motors propelled by self-generated forces has sustained substantial interest in the scientific community in recent years. While the ability to design motors in varied geometries with unique properties is well established, the capacity to precisely control the placement and transport of objects at this length scale is much more limited. Such capabilities would be valuable for bottom-up assembly of superstructures and devices, targeted delivery of chemicals etc. We propose to develop methodologies for the controlled motion of a single and an ensemble of nanomotors. We have recently developed one such chemically propelled synthetic motor. We plan to investigate the collective dynamics of such self-propelled particles, which will help us understand the possible universal features of collective motion present at all length scales in nature. Another question we plan to answer is how do nanomotors move and respond to chemically active environments, and can the inhomogeneity in the environment be used to influence the dynamics of motors and possibly provide a way to control their motions?Our long term goal is to design and study the dynamics of a self-propelled polymer nanomotors.