Dr. Vikram Karde
Senior Scientist @ AstraZeneca, UK
Email: vikramkarde@phd2011.iitgn.ac.in
Vikram joined IITGN in 2011. His thesis title is "Property Improvement of Fine Pharmaceutical Powders under Varying Humidity Conditions through Nano-coating". His thesis focused on how size, shape, surface energetics, surface roughness of member particles influences the overall bulk behavior of powder including its property under humid condition. Vikram has a brief stint in Pharmaceutical Industry in Mumbai before joining the doctoral program at IIT Gandhinagar. He was an active member of Research Scholar Forum at IIT Gandhinagar, and organized National Level annual Research Scholar Conclave at IIT Gandhinagar. Also, he mentored several undergraduate and Master's students in DryProTech Lab. He has published several journal papers (RSC Advances, Powder Technology, Advanced Powder Technology, Food Bioscience, Pharmaceutical Research, Int. J. Pharmaceutics ) and presented few International conferences such as AAPS (Orlando), AIChE (Salt Lake City) and PGBS (Patiala). Vikram also visited Particle Engineering Research Center (PERC) labs of the University of Florida for a very short time during his PhD @ IITGN. He defended his thesis in 2017 and joined as Post-Doctoral Fellow at Imperial College London.
Dr. Sanat Chandra Maiti
R&D Scientist @ Foseco, Netherlands
Email: maiti_sanat@phd2012.iitgn.ac.in
Sanat joined IIT Gandhinagar in July 2012. He completed his B.Sc (Hons) in Chemistry (2006) and B.Tech (2009) in Chemical Engineering from Calcutta University. He did his M.Tech (2011) in Chemical Engineering from IIT Kanpur. Before joining the Ph.D program at IIT Gandhinagar he has a very brief experience in teaching. His research focussed on the solid phase reactions, and influence of nano-/micron- size additives to prepare materials for different applications such as materials for Li-ion batteries, Cement industry, CO2 capture etc. He availed overseas research experience in Clemson University, USA under the supervision of Prof. Raj K Bordia for 5 months. Sanat has published several peer-reviewed International Journal papers (Cement and Concrete Research, Thermochimica Acta, Reaction Chemistry & Engineering, Ceramic International, Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry etc.) and International Conference paper including ICTAC 2016 (Orlando) and AIChE (San Fransisco, USA). Apart from his research, he has a hands-on experience with different sophisticated instruments like XRD, FESEM, TG-DSC, BET, Powder Rheometer etc. Sanat mentored several undergraduate and Master students for their research projects in DryProTech Lab. Sanat defended his PhD thesis in August 2018 and joined as Postdoctoral Fellow at Clemson University, South Carolina, USA.
Dr. Deepa Dixit
R&D Scientist @ Honeywell UOP, Gurgaon
Email: deepa.dixit@alumni.iitgn.ac.in
Deepa joined IIT Gandhinagar in July 2014. She completed her B.Tech and M.Tech in Chemical Engineering from RGPV Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh in 2010 and 2014 respectively. Before joining the Ph.D. program at IIT Gandhinagar, she taught Chemical Engineering undergraduate students in an Engineering college for about one and a half years. Her research focus is on the influence of surface roughness on wetting property of very fine powders. Her research focussed on to understand surface roughness (micro and nano-scale) and surface chemistry affect the wetting behavior of particulate solids. She used different surface modification approaches such as chemical, plasma, lithography etc. Her research enabled us to design Point-of-use (POU) water disinfection systems and superhydrophobic antibacterial surfaces. Deepa applied an Indian patent and published several international papers (such as Scientific Reports, Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, Advanced Powder Technology, Environmental Science & Technology Letters, Ceramic International etc.) and conference papers such as International Conferences at MCPT 2015 (Pune), PGBSIA 2016 (Jaipur), AIChE 2017 annual meeting (Minneapolis, US), and International Conference on Applied Surface Science (Pisa, Italy). She mentored several undergraduate and Master students for their research projects in DryProTech Lab. Deepa won the prestigious "SITARE- Gandhian Young Technological Innovation (GYTI) Award 2020" for non-electric and affordable surface engineered particle-based point-of-use water disinfection. She graduated in August 2020 and joined IIT Delhi Chemical Engineering as a Post-Doctoral Fellow under Research Associate (DBT-RA) Fellowship 2020..
Dr. Sophia Varghese
Research Associate @ Purdue University, USA
Email: sophia.varghese@alumni.iitgn.ac.in
Sophia joined IIT Gandhinagar in December 2013. She completed Bachelor of Engineering in Chemical Engineering from Veer Narmad South Gujarat University (2011) and M.Tech in Chemical Engineering from Nirma University (2013). Sophia worked on improving wetting and dissolution of poorly soluble drug using the solventless co-milling technique, controlled release of drugs using bio-compatible, biodegradable nano-impregnated bio-polymeric matrix such as the hydrogel. Her research explored the drug release and its kinetics of anticancer drugs as well as poorly soluble non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. She explored the targeted site delivery of the drug-using cell line studies. She applied for an Indian Patent, published several International Journal papers (RSC Advances, Int. J. of Pharmaceutics, Pharmaceutical Research, Advanced Powder Technology). She presented her work in the International conference such as GBSIA (Jaipur), AIChE (2017), PBP 2018 (Granada, Spain) and AERC 2018 (Sorrento, Italy) etc. Sophia availed overseas research experience program and visited the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA for few months. Sophia graduated in August 2020 and joined as Post Doctoral Fellow in Chemical Engineering at IIT Bombay. Sophia is presently Post Doctoral Fellow in Chemical Engineering at Purdue University.
Neetu Varun
Scientist @ Macleods Pharmaceuticals, Mumbai
Email: neetu.varun@alumni.iitgn.ac.in
Neetu joined IIT Gandhinagar in July 2015. She completed her B.Tech in Chemical Engineering from HBTI, Kanpur in 2010. Before joining IITGN, she was a Project Assistant in CSIR - Indian Institute of Petroleum, Dehradun for 2 years and Process Engineer at Vedanta Resources. Her research focus is to understand the impact of interparticle forces on mixing and demixing of cohesive granular materials. Her PhD thesis is on "Engineered Pharmaceutical Formulations for Improved Dry Powder Inhaler (DPI) Performance: Particle Engineering and Mechanistic Insights". She investigated various engineered partcles for pulmonary drug delivery and published her papers in Powder Technology, Advanced Powder Technology . She defended her PhD thisis in March 2023 and joined as Scientist in Macleods Pharmaceuticals.
Dr. Vinod Morya
Research Associate @ University of Albany, NY
Email: vinodm@iitgn.ac.in
Vinod joined the group in August 2018 after his integrated B.Tech and M.Tech in Biotechnology and Bioinformatics from Centre for Converging Technologies, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. He is working on Functoinal DNA hydrogels and its Biomedical Applications such as Targeted Biosensing. Before joining the PhD program, he was working as a Junior Research Fellow in my research group. He has about 5 years of research experience and winner of “Vibrant Gujarat startup Challenge-2016”. He has already published couple of papers in International journals such as ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering, Front. Chem., ACS Omega , Colloid and Interface Science Communications , ChemBioChem etc. Vinod is also actively involved in operation of the CRTDH Lab. He has completed his PhD Thesis on DNA-based Engineered Hydrogels for Improved Cell Growth and Biosensing Applications" and presently Research Associate at University of Albany, NY
Dr. Aniket Ratnaparkhi
Email: aniket.ratnaparkhi@iitgn.ac.in
Aniket joined the group in August 2018. He did his B.Tech in Chemical Engineering from National Institute of Technology (NIT) Nagpur in 2014. Before joining IITGN, Aniket worked as 'Process Engineer' for about two and a half years in Reliance Industries Ltd and then a very short stint in Burns & McDonnell Engineering India Pvt Ltd. Ankit is trying to understand the impact of soiling (dust deposition) on solar photovoltaics which is responsible for a major loss in the solar industry. He is trying to quantify the soiling under various consitions and developing surface engineered solar panel materials to mitigate the loss. He has published multiple of papers in Solar Energy. Aniket visited Duke University as a part of the collaborative SPARC project and recently complted his PhD (Thesis title: "Demystifying soiling loss of solar PVs: Its reduction and prediction").