Department of Chemical Engineering,IISc

We are proud to share that Shreya Chowdhury, a research student from Prof. Narendra Dixit's Lab, has been selected as one of the 33 recipients of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Global Health Travel Award. This prestigious award is given to outstanding early-career researchers who are making significant contributions to the field of global health.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Global Health Travel Award will provide Shreya with the opportunity to attend the Keystone Symposium on K1 HIV and (Re)Emerging Viruses: Aligning Lessons Across Pandemics, which will be held at the Herrenhausen Palace in Hannover, Germany, from April 8-11, 2024.

Indian Institute of Science (IISc)
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

We are excited to announce that two of our students, Amar Krishna Gopinath and Bharat Desikan, have been selected for the prestigious Prime Minister's Research Fellowship (PMRF) program!
Amar's research focuses on the study of antimicrobial pathways through bacterial membranes and proteins while Bharat studies enhanced evaporation through functionalized nanoporous graphene in water methanol solutions.
We wish them all the best in their future endeavors!

🎉 Thrilled to share that a recent article from Prof. Ayappa's group has been featured on the cover of the prestigious Biophysical Journal.

Publication Alert in JACS Au
Title: Selective Photonic Gasification of Strained Oxygen Clusters on Graphene for Tuning Pore Size in the Å Regime

Amidst the pressing concerns of global warming, there's an emergent demand for energy-efficient gas separation techniques. Membranes, with their inherent energy efficiency and simplicity, stand out as promising solutions. In this regard, single-layer graphene, owing to its atomic thickness, holds the potential for unparalleled gas permeance and selectivity. However, achieving a precise and consistent pore size distribution remains a significant challenge.

In a pioneering study, researchers from EPFL, Switzerland, and the Department of Chemical Engineering, IISc, Bangalore, have unveiled a groundbreaking method for photonic gasification of oxygen clusters on single-layer graphene. This allows for an unprecedented capability to independently tailor pore size and density. Initial steps involved the growth of oxygen clusters (acting as pore precursors) on the graphene using ozone. The inherent strain within these clusters forms an ether core, which when exposed to brief light exposure, undergoes gasification, resulting in highly precise control over pore size.

By modulating the temperature during ozone functionalization, the team was able to influence the cluster formation kinetics. Notably, this allowed a decoupling between pore density and size— traditionally viewed as a trade-off in the field. The implications are immense: achieving this balance led to superior H2 permeance while retaining optimal H2/N2 and CH4/N2 selectivity. Additionally, dedicated molecular dynamics simulations were performed to analyze the atomistic details of the gas permeation and selectivity.

This rapid and precise method, termed photonic gasification, heralds a significant advancement in the scalable applications of nanoporous graphene membranes.

Credits:

Guidance & Supervision:
Kumar Varoon Agrawal (EPFL),
Ganapathy Ayappa (Department of Chemical Engineering, IISc, Bangalore),
Oleg Yazyev (EPFL)

Lab Experiments & AC-HRTEM Imaging: Luc Bondaz
MD Simulations: Anshaj Ronghe and Luc Bondaz
DFT Computations: Kristians Cernevics and Anshaj Ronghe
XPS Study: Shaoxian Li
Ozone Gasification Insights: Jian Hao

Selective Photonic Gasification of Strained Oxygen Clusters on Graphene for Tuning Pore Size in the Å Regime Controlling the size of single-digit pores, such as those in graphene, with an Å resolution has been challenging due to the limited understanding of pore evolution at the atomic scale. The controlled oxidation of graphene has led to Å-scale pores; however, obtaining a fine control over pore evolut...

Congratulations to our alumnus, Prof. Rajnish Kumar (Department of Chemical Engineering, IIT Madras) for being awarded the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for his contributions to fundamental understanding of the nucleation and growth of clathrate hydrates, CO2 sequestration in solid hydrates and methane recovery from marine gas hydrates. Prof. Rajnish completed his MSc (Engg) from the Department of Chemical Engineering, IISc in 2003.

We are delighted to share that 3 of our MTech students got selected for the Shell Fellowship this year. They will be interning with Shell in the summer and working on a Shell-IISc collaborative project for their MTech research. Congratulations and all the best!

IISc Bangalore

A greener solution for water purification is within reach!!!

In the latest publication by Prof K Ganapathy Ayappa and his Ph.D. student Anshaj Ronghe in ACS Publications, the researchers have shown the effectiveness of nanoporous graphene in enhancing evaporation flux from salt solutions, paving the way towards a greener and eco-friendly strategy for a water-stressed world.

This study demonstrates that small-sized 4.54 Å graphene nanopores can amplify evaporation flux by a staggering 7-11 times for monovalent salt solutions (LiCl, NaCl, and KCl) with concentrations ranging from 0.6 to 3.0 M. By delving into the atomistic intricacies, the researchers unveiled how these functionalized nanopores facilitate rapid dynamics of the water molecules, significantly reducing the energy required for evaporation. Particularly fascinating was the researchers' observation of salt and concentration-dependent enhancements in evaporation flux, achieved through the implementation of cation-π interactions, revealing the remarkable selectivity of nanoporous graphene for various ions.

Traditional desalination methods like reverse osmosis and thermal distillation are notorious for their high energy consumption and operational costs. As the global demand for sustainable water technologies escalates, this study provides an environmentally friendly alternative for obtaining fresh water from saline solutions, especially in low-resource environments. Unlike conventional approaches that solely target the removal of salt and other dissolved minerals from seawater or brackish water, this research offers unparalleled versatility, enabling efficient purification of water with a wide range of non-volatile impurities, including heavy metals, making it suitable for applications ranging from drinking water production to industrial wastewater treatment. Moreover, unlike previous methods relying on high external pressures for reverse osmosis, this study introduces a novel and cost-effective strategy by leveraging Å-scale graphene nanopores to achieve clean water through enhanced evaporation fluxes from salt solutions.

🔬 Read more about this innovative research: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.langmuir.3c00797


IISc Bangalore

Graphene Nanopores Enhance Water Evaporation from Salt Solutions: Exploring the Effects of Ions and Concentration With increased water stress, the development of clean water technologies is an active area of research. Evaporation-based solutions offer the advantage of low energy consumption, and recently a 10–30 fold enhancement in water evaporation flux has been observed through Å-scale graphene nanopores (...

Many congratulations to our PhD student, Shruti Soni, and M.Tech. (Res) student, Shiv Kumar, for being selected as out of a total of 40 participants and designated as "Agastya Science Communication Fellows" in the 3-minute research presentation contest. The event was organized as a part of Inaugural Research Symposium by Division of Mechanical Sciences Indian Institute of Science (IISc).
In the second round of the contest, Shruti secured the among the top 10 participants.

The fellowship is offered by the Agastya International Foundation, a non-profit organization based in India, and is designed to recognize and support outstanding individuals who are dedicated to science communication and education.

Congratulations! Ayushi on your article titled 'A diagnostic next door: detecting drug-resistant tuberculosis without breaking the bank' being selected in the top 100 popular science stories under the Ph.D. category in the AWSAR competition 2023 organized by DST, GOI.