Contact
Biography
I am a theoretical physicist working in the field of condensed matter physics as a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Physics at the University of Dundee in Scotland. I joined the School of Science and Engineering at Dundee in January, 2024.
I did my doctoral work (August 2012-June 2018) at the S N Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Kolkata (named eponymously after the Physicist who "discovered" Bosons). This time was spent investigating a plethora of novel phenomena in exotic materials like spin crossover polymers, 2D electron gases in oxide heterostructures, hybrid perovskites etc using first principles calculations.
After I finished my PhD in June 2018, I obtained a Training and Research in Italian Laboratories (TRIL) Research Fellowship from the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) and was stationed to work at Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR) Instituto SPIN, in Chieti, Italy till March 2019. During my time at ICTP I worked on the emerging field of 2D ferromagnets.
Thereafter I worked as a Post Doctoral Fellow at the Graz University of Technology (April 2019- April 2021), where I had experience of working in strongly correlated systems employing Dynamical Mean Field Theory.
After this, my focus and attention shifted to energy research and I moved to the University of Cambridge (April 2021-Jan 2024) to study using DMFT, GW Approximation and various advanced theoretical spectroscopic methods the physics behind degradation of Li-ion battery cathodes. I was funded by the Battery Degradation project of The Faraday Institute, the flagship battery research consortium in UK.
Research
My research deals with theoretical methods to study electronic structure of materials from first principles perspectives employing a plethora of tools and techniques like Density Functional Theory (DFT), Density Functional Perturbation Theory (DFPT), GW Approximation, and Dynamical Mean Field Theory (DMFT). The main goal of my research is to understand by very careful theoretical analysis the effect electron-electron interactions has on properties of materials.
My interest primarily has been in exotic phenomena in novel materials like spin crossover in metal-organic complexes, 2D electron gases at the interfaces of oxide heterostructures, Magnetism in low dimensional materials with symmetry breaking due to spin orbit coupling, Non-Fermi liquid phases in Correlated and Hund's metals, Weyl and Dirac phases in topological materials etc.
Of late I have been particularly interested in energy materials including both batteries and solar cells, since I believe an energy transition is essential for the survival of our planet! I have been engaged in studying degradation mechanisms in both batteries and solar cells. In case of batteries I am particularly interested in strongly correlated cathode materials where electron correlation gives rise to exotic effects like anion redox, or phase transitions leading to structural transformations in cathodes, both of which lead to eventual degradation of cathode materials and failure of batteries on cycling. In terms of solar cells my interest has been in the field of hybrid perovskites solar cells where we study a variety of exotic phenomena like spin transitions, piezochromism, formation of interfaces leading to enhanced charge transfer and tunable band gaps leading to enhancement of efficiency and enhanced stability in presence of moisture etc.
Research interests
- Electronic Structure Theory of correlated materials,
- Density Functional Theory, Dynamical Mean-Field Theory, GW Approximation, Density functional Perturbation Theory
- Energy Materials, Li-ion Battery, Cathode Materials, Hybrid Perovskite solar cells,
- Correlated Oxides, Oxide heterostructures, 2D electron gas
- Spin crossover polymers
- Magnetism, 2D magnets
Teaching
- University of Dundee, PH41007, Condensed Matter Physics - I, 2023-2024
- University of Cambridge, Nat. Sci. Tripos, Part - II, Paper A4 - Theoretical Techniques, 2022-2023
- University of Cambridge, Nat. Sci. Tripos, Part - II, Paper A4 - Theoretical Techniques, 2021-2022
- La Sapienza University, Rome, MSc. in Physics, Seminar course - Magnetism in 2D, 2021