Fulbright-Kalam Fellowship for Academic and Professional Excellence (Research and Teaching) Archives

Anushree Malik

Dr. Anushree Malik is Institute Chair Professor at Centre for Rural Development and Technology, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, New Delhi. She works in the broad area of biological waste treatment, algal biorefineries, and resource recovery. She has been leading several carbon negative-integrated algal biorefinery projects targeting at least six sustainable development goals via product formulation as well as technology development for on-site municipal and industrial effluent’s treatment.

Dr. Malik received her Ph.D. from IIT Delhi, New Delhi in 2000. Subsequently, she worked as JSPS post-doctoral fellow at Utsumoniya University, Japan and as an Assistant Professor at School of Environmental Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi before joining IIT Delhi in 2004. She had successful international collaborations with Netherlands, Sri Lanka, Brazil, besides many national projects and industrial collaborations. Dr. Malik received the DST-Lockheed Martin India Innovation Growth Program Award (2015), BRSI Fellow Award (2019), and also featured in a list of 75 women in STEAM disciplines, an honor jointly bestowed by the Government of India and the British High Commission.

Dr. Malik’s Fulbright-Kalam project aims to design an experimental framework for 3D printing specific algal-bacterial communities with well-defined architectures and compositions. The studies will enhance our understanding of how such defined algal-bacterial communities contribute to carbon sequestration in response to environmental stresses, and whether carbon sorption and release turn close loop with algal communities trapping biogenic CO2. For her teaching component, Dr. Malik plans to teach courses related to Biofuels and Green Chemistry.

Subhasish Basu Majumder

Dr. Subhasish Basu Majumder is a Professor in the Materials Science Center at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, West Bengal. In recent years, he has been actively involved in the development of lithium/sodium ion rechargeable batteries, battery/supercapacitor hybrid and semiconducting metal oxide chemiresistive gas sensors.

Dr. Basu Majumder received his Ph.D. from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. As a researcher he has worked in the USA and Germany before joining IIT Kharagpur as a faculty member in 2006. He is now working on several national missions funded by the Government of India. Dr. Basu Majumder is a recipient of the Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship for experienced researchers (2004-2005). He is currently serving as an editorial board member of Scientific Reports (Nature) and Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics (IOP Sciences). He is a Fellow of the West Bengal Academy of Science and Technology and a recipient of the Materials Research Society of India medal.

The Lithium–Sulphur battery is far more environmentally friendly as it uses only scarce lithium, has significantly higher specific energy density than lithium-ion cells, and is easier to recycle.

Dr. Basu Majumder’s Fulbright–Kalam project aims to develop a facile one-step scalable process to increase the loading and conductivity of sulphur; retard long chain polysulphides shuttling, tackle volumetric fluctuation of active particles and inhibit the lithium anode corrosion together with its dendritic growth during discharge – charge cycles. The developed Li – S system would yield increased discharge capacity with excellent cycleability and rate performance.

Suneet Singh

Prof. Suneet Singh is currently Head of the Department of Energy Science and Engineering at IIT Bombay. He was a post-doctoral fellow at the Idaho National Lab in the U.S. before joining IIT Bombay. He did his PhD in nuclear engineering from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. He graduated with a master’s in nuclear engineering and technology in 2000 from IIT Kanpur. His research focuses on efficient numerical techniques for neutron diffusion and fluid flow. Along with this, he has been investigating bifurcations in a number of systems, including nuclear coupled thermal hydraulics and two-phase flows fluids. In 2014, he was awarded the Bhaskara Advanced Solar Energy (BASE) fellowship by the Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF). He also received the S. P. Sukhatme Award for Teaching Excellence at IIT Bombay in 2023.

As the Fulbright-Kalam Climate Fellowship for Academic and Professional Excellence Scholar at Purdue University, IN, Prof. Singh is working on understanding pathways for hydrogen and heat generation along with power generation. Nuclear power stations (NPPs) release no greenhouse gases when in operation, emitting approximately the same amount of carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions per unit of electricity as wind and solar energy. Load following is a technique by which power plants alter their power production in response to daily fluctuations in demand and energy prices. Because of the high construction cost of NPPs, they are typically not intended for load following and are classified as base load plants. As a result, their use for hydrogen and/ or heat generation during low-load periods provides both economic and environmental benefits.

Ajay Biswas

Dr. Ajay Biswas is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Agartala, Tripura. He obtained his PhD in engineering from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. He has around thirty-four years of experience in the field, which includes teaching and research in engineering and the sciences. He is a life member of several professional societies including SESI, IEI (India), FOSET, ASME, and IIW. He was awarded as principal investigator of a prestigious project sponsored by the Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India.

Dr. Biswas is interested in green energy, sustainable energy, climate change, and the development of advanced engineered materials and techniques.

As a Fulbright-Kalam Climate Fellowship for Academic and Professional Excellence (Research and Teaching) scholar at Kansas State University, KS, Dr. Biswas is developing an environment friendly recharge-free aluminum air battery and study its performance. Successful development and future modification of this battery will contribute to long collaborative research between the U.S. and India and will reduce carbon emissions, which is beneficial for the environment.