Host City India: Atlanta

Shailina Srivastava

Ms. Shailina Srivastava is a PhD scholar in the Aerosol Group of the Department of Civil Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai. Under the mentorship of Prof. Sachin S. Gunthe, her research focuses on the intricate interactions between aerosols from diverse regions across the Indian subcontinent, water vapor, and UV radiation under subsaturated conditions. She has conducted extensive measurement campaigns, ranging from southern India to the Himalayan region, collecting ambient aerosol samples to investigate how variations in aerosol properties influence cloud formation, precipitation processes, and the atmospheric evolution of these particles.

Shailina holds a master’s degree in environmental sciences (Environmental Technology) from Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, and a bachelor’s degree in Botany and Industrial Microbiology from Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gorakhpur University, Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh. The unique climatic conditions of India inspired her to delve into this critical area of research, contributing to a better understanding of the nation’s climate dynamics. Beyond her academic pursuits, she enjoys reading and traveling.

As a Fulbright-Kalam Fellow, Shailina is conducting experimental work at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, under the supervision of Dr. Pengfei Liu. Her experiments focus on generating atmospherically relevant organic aerosols from various precursors and examining their interactions with water vapor and UV radiation. She employs advanced techniques and instruments, including the quartz crystal microbalance, to gain deeper insights into these processes.

Atanu Betal

Dr. Atanu Betal is a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada. He earned his BSc in 2014 from Garhbeta College, affiliated with Vidyasagar University, West Bengal, and completed his MSc in 2017 at Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya, Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh. In September 2023, he was awarded a PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology, Jodhpur. He was a Senior Research Fellow from January 2024 to March 2024 at IITJ.

Dr. Betal’s research interests are in the field of experimental condensed matter physics, primarily focused on the fabrication of resistive memory, neuromorphic synaptic devices using organic materials, and scanning tunneling microscopy of low-dimensional materials. He has published 34 research articles (eight as the first author and 26 as a co-author) in reputable international journals.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Postdoctoral Research Fellow at GIT, Georgia, Dr. Betal is focusing on the fabrication of vertical FETs and their application in neuromorphic synaptic devices — an area of growing interest among scientists for advancing artificial intelligence hardware. During his fellowship, Dr. Betal aims to explore different organic semiconducting materials for the FET with sub-nanometer channel length.

Abhishek Dixit

Dr. Abhishek Dixit is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Earth Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, Gujarat. He earned his BTech in 2015 from JSS Noida, affiliated to Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Technical University, and completed his MTech in 2018 at IIT Guwahati. In March 2024, he was awarded a PhD from IIT Guwahati. As part of his doctoral research, he worked as a guest PhD student at the University of Goettingen, Germany, under the NAMASTE+ program funded by DAAD and the German Ministry of Education and Research.

Dr. Dixit’s research spans fluvial sedimentology, groundwater, glaciers, and oceans, with publications in leading international journals. He has also visited the University of Leeds under the BRAINSTORM project, funded by the university’s International Strategy Fund, to advance collaborations on Himalayan research.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Dr. Dixit is studying the impacts of large mass-wasting events, such as landslides and ice-rock avalanches, on river dynamics and flooding risks in the Brahmaputra River basin. His work combines geochronology, remote sensing, and numerical simulations to evaluate the consequences of these events in a warming Himalayan environment.

Samriddhi Saxena

Ms. Samriddhi Saxena is a PhD candidate in the Department of Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science at the Indian Institute of Technology Indore, focusing on the development of oxide cathodes for sodium-ion batteries. Her doctoral research focuses on designing efficient and eco-friendly alternatives to lithium-ion batteries, addressing the critical need for sustainable and scalable energy storage systems. She has expertise in synthesizing and characterizing air-sensitive materials using various structural and electrochemical techniques.

Samriddhi holds a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from R.V. College of Engineering, Bengaluru, and a master’s degree from IIT Indore, where she received the Institute Silver Medal for her work on biphasic layered oxide cathodes. She has been awarded the Prime Minister’s Research Fellowship and has presented her research at various conferences, publishing in top journals. She has also worked as a Process Engineer at Hindustan Zinc Limited, leading a Six Sigma project on magnesium removal from ZnSO4 solutions.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Doctoral Research fellow at Georgia Institute of Technology, Samriddhi is hoping to develop technologically relevant sodium-ion-based solid-state cells by employing melt infiltration of solid-state electrolytes into electrodes. Her research seeks to achieve performance metrics comparable to liquid electrolyte-based cells at practical charge/discharge rates, addressing key challenges in solid-state energy storage. This work contributes to global advancements in renewable energy technologies by tackling the scalability and performance barriers of sodium-ion-based solid-state batteries. Samriddhi is passionate about teaching and enjoys traveling, cooking, and gardening.

Sumit Baudh

Dr. Sumit Baudh (they/them or he/him) is a Professor of Law at O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, Haryana. Dr. Baudh received their Doctor of Juridical Science (S.J.D.) from the University of California, Los Angeles, CA (UCLA) School of Law, Master of Laws (LL.M.) from the London School of Economics, London, UK, and a Bachelor of Arts and Laws with Honors (B.A. LL.B. Hons.) from National Law School of India University, Bengaluru, Karnataka.

As a former British Chevening scholar, Dr. Baudh has held prestigious Fellowships including the University of California Human Rights Fellow, Berkeley, Michael D. Palm Fellow of the Williams Institute, UCLA School of Law, Fellow of the Center for Intersectionality and Social Policy Studies, Columbia Law School, and the Transnational Law Institute Fellow, King’s College London. Dr. Baudh is qualified to practice law as an Advocate in India and enrolled as a Solicitor with The Law Society, England and Wales. As an independent consultant, Dr. Baudh has advised national and international organizations including the US based Arcus Foundation, the United Nations Development Program, the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, and the Norway-based LLH.

As the first Fulbright-Nehru Visiting Chair at Emory University, Dr. Baudh’s research is titled ‘A Comparative Review of Civil and Human Rights in India and the United States of America. —from a Critical Race and Dalit perspective’; amidst other sources, the research is informed by classroom instructions of a taught course on Critical Race Theory and Caste.

Sarbeswar Sahoo

Dr. Sarbeswar Sahoo is working as an Associate Professor of Sociology in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi. He was Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the University of Erfurt (Germany) and Charles Wallace Fellow at Queen’s University Belfast (UK). He received his Ph.D. from the National University of Singapore and has held Visiting Fellowships at University of Groningen (Netherlands), University of Cardiff (UK), University of Muenster (Germany), University of Erfurt (Germany), Roskilde University (Denmark), Queen’s University Belfast (UK), and NUS (Singapore). His research interests include Neoliberalism, Sociology of Development, and Sociology of Religion. He is the author of Civil Society and Democratization in India (Routledge, 2013) and Pentecostalism and Politics of Conversion in India (Cambridge University Press, 2018).

During his Fulbright-Nehru Research Fellowship, Dr. Sahoo aims to compare the experiences of Bhil Pentecostals in India and Black Pentecostals in the US and discuss how different cultural contexts influence peoples’ lived religious experiences and how Pentecostalism is transforming the everyday socio-political lifeworld of people at the margins. A comparison of the Bhils with the experiences of Black Pentecostals in the US will help us understand not just the “contextual” nature of religious experiences and activities, but also the relationships between religion, state and secularism.

Melari Shisha Nongrum

Dr. Melari Shisha Nongrum is Associate Professor at the Indian Institute of Public Health, Shillong, Meghalaya. She is an indigenous woman from the Khasi indigenous community of Meghalaya, located in the northeastern region of India. Dr. Nongrum has a master’s in social work from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. She conducted her research on sociocultural factors of vitamin A deficiency among children in Meghalaya, which was part of her doctoral thesis at Martin Luther Christian University, Shillong. Since her Ph.D., Dr. Nongrum has worked in the field of public health, especially in traditional knowledge systems of food and healing of the indigenous communities in her region. She acquired expertise on this subject through research and community projects, grounded in active community engagement. She co-authored the chapter “Treasures from shifting cultivation in the Himalayan’s evergreen forest” in a publication led by Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, Indigenous Peoples’ Food Systems: Insights on sustainability and resilience from the front line of climate change. This publication was awarded the 2021 Best in the World Sustainability Report Award by the Hallbars Sustainability Research Organization.

As Fulbright-Nehru Visiting Chair at Emory University, Dr. Nongrum’s is working on “The Multifactorial Facets of Tribal Health: Development of a Training Module on Tribal Health for Public Health and Allied Health Professionals”. She is also teaching a course titled “Multifaceted Nature of Tribes in India and the Traditional knowledge Systems of Food and Healing: Experiences from Tribal Communities in Northeastern India”.