Dr. Surjyakanta Rana- new member of Functional Materials Department

That´s a pleasure to announce that FunGlass Centre was enriched by a new member Dr. Surjyakanta Rana from India.

He received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Council Of Scientific And Industrial Research–Institute Of Minerals And Materials Technology (CSIR–IMMT) and Utkal University, Odisha, India in 2013 with the thesis entitled “Development of modified mesoporous materials towards various organic transformation reactions”. From 2013 to 2017, he was a postdoctoral researcher in Department of Chemistry, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban South Africa. From 2017 to 2019, he was a postdoctoral    researcher in Department of Chemistry, University of Antwerp, Belgium. From 2019 to 2021, he was a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral researcher in Department of Chemistry, University of Antwerp, Belgium. From 2020 to 2021 he was a Visiting Scientist, VITO, Belgium. He has experience in an interdisciplinary area of research ranging from chemistry to materials science. He worked on various materials like mesoporous silica, zirconia, CeO₂, TiO₂, layered double hydroxides, acid active clay materials (montmorillonite), carbon-based graphene materials, functionalization, nanomaterials, organo-inorganic hybrid materials, nanocomposite materials and used them in different type of organic transformation reactions, multicomponent reactions and removal of heavy metal ions from polluted water. He also worked on plasma catalytic reforming of CO₂ over 3D printed catalyst/ supported Cu catalysts. He mastered multiple methods for material synthesis (to enhance metallic dispersion) as well as physicochemical characterization of materials by various spectroscopic and analytical characterization such as TG-DTA, XRD, XPS, TPR-TPD-TPO, UV-Vis, FT-IR, TEM, HRTEM, SEM, Raman, N₂ sorption for porosity and surface area, etc. With his deep knowledge in this field, he could able to publish 52 papers in International journals of high repute likes Journal of Material Chemistry A, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, Journal of Physical Chemistry C, Catalysis Science & Technology, Chemical engineering journal, Dalton Transactions etc. and 2 book chapters. He guided four Ph.D., two Master and two bachelor students. He is also Editor/Associate editor/Editorial board members/Reviewers in different Scientific Journals. He joined Functional Materials Department. Dr. Rana will focus on semiconductor-based materials for H₂ generation.

Welcome and we wish you all the best in Funglass, Surjyakanta!