Nanoscale Energy & Surface Engineering Group
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Postdoctoral research associates
Dr Irwing Moises, PhD
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Dr Moises holds PhD in water sciences, and was working as a PDRA at University of Texas Austin. At Ausitn his research was focused on insights into emerging photocatalytic properties of brass, an earth-abundant material, the removal of emerging pollutants. The postdoctoral findings evidenced that brass photocorrosion brings an oxide n-p heterojunction, which could induce photocatalytic activity. This finding advances how to use inexpensive, globally available, and well-known material to remove contaminants from water. He is expert in water chemistry (LC-MS, HPLC, TOC, fluorescence and UV-Vis spectroscopy, ICP - OES) and characterize nanomaterials (SEM, XRD, XPS). He is conversant in measuring reactive oxygen species and photon flux of emission sources, which is crucial for photocatalytic experiments.
​Dr Moises will be working on designing large scale photocatalytic reactor and integrating Nanomaterials on to the reactor for textile waste water treatment. His project is funded by Eu Horizon 2020 program for textile waste water treatment (https://waste2fresh.eu).
Dr Camila Silva Ribeiro, BEng, MEng, PhD
Dr Camila finished her PhD from Department of Chemical Engineering at the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS - Brazil). During her PhD she was working on Bismuth-based catalysts for the photocatalytic reduction of CO2 under UV/vis radiation.
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She will be researching in the development of new 2D materials, and integrated them in to reactor through plasma based process. Her project is funded by Eu Horizon 2020 textile waste water treatment and Royal Academy of Engineering,(https://waste2fresh.eu).
Dr Ajay Kumar, MSc PhD,
Dr Ajay completed his PhD at Indian Institute Technology Mandi, He was mainly working on plasmon and up conversion mediated photocatalytic materials for environmental remediation and organic transformations".
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Ajay will be working on functionalisation and new methods of deposition of photocatalytic materials and optimising its properties for industry dye degradation. His project is funded by Eu Horizon 2020 textile waste water treatment. (https://waste2fresh.eu).
Dr Avishek Dey, MSc, MTech, PhD
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Avishek did his PhD (2018) under the lead supervision of Prof Satheesh Krishnamurthy form The Open University, UK in collaboration with NASA Ames Research Center, USA with Thesis title “applications of atmospheric pressure plasma in surface engineering”. His dissertation was aimed at three different applications of atmospheric pressure plasmas: printing nanomaterials, functionalization of nanomaterials and deactivation of airborne microbes. For all the contributions emphasis was given on studying the effects of plasma on surfaces. He is trained on soft X-ray spectroscopy techniques and has collaboration with leading beamlines around the world.
Following his PhD, Avishek took postdoc position in Prof Krishnamurthy group and worked on two funded projects. 2018-2019 RAENG funded “Integrated wastewater treatment”. Here he developed solar powered electrocatalysts for industrial effluent degradation in sea water. 2019-2021 UKIERI funded project on recycling Li-ion batteries hosted jointly by UK and India. This project was to sustainably recycle battery electrodes and generate value added products.
Avishek joined Palgrave group, UCL Dept of Chemistry in March 2021 as a research fellow on The Faraday Institute funded project “NEXGENNA”. He will be using his expertise on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to understand Na-ion battery properties in-situ under operating conditions.
Dr Paheli Ghosh
Paheli Ghosh (http://www.open.ac.uk/people/pg5499) has recently completed her PhD from the Open University under the supervision of Prof Satheesh Krishnamurthy (http://www.open.ac.uk/people/sk9268) and Dr Tony Nixon (http://www.open.ac.uk/people/tpn2). Her PhD thesis was titled ‘Engineering of materials for hole transport applications in perovskite solar cells’. Her research interests centre on the engineering of materials for perovskite solar cells, tuning the properties of organic, inorganic materials and composites using an atmospheric pressure plasma functionalization technique, aerosol-assisted plasma jet printing of thin films for perovskite devices, electron microscopy and soft X-ray spectroscopy analysis for understanding complex chemistries of molecules and electrochemical processes and designing/development of equipment for large-scale roll-to-roll processes.
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Email: paheli.ghosh@open.ac.uk and pahelighosh@gmail.com
PhD Students
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Gauthaman Chandrabose
Gauthaman is from heritage town Karaikudi, India, pursuing my doctoral degree since October 2017. In my doctoral work, I am evaluating the importance of heterostructures and lattice defects in the metal oxides (TiO2,CuO and MoS2), and its fundamental understanding on water splitting and water treatment application. I mainly use atmospheric pressure plasma to functionalise the metal oxides to enhance the photocatalytic/electrocatalytic activity. Key characterisation techniques are with electron microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to understand the structural and chemical states of the compounds.
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Outside the lab, in my spare time, I am mostly exploring the city and figuring out what other great places I can visit in and around UK and Europe. I enjoy myself reminiscing with world wars history, especially how Hitler ruled his kingdom and the Rise and Fall of Nazi’s.
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Contact: gauthaman.chandrabose@open.ac.uk
Lois Afua Okyerewaa Damptey
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Lois is a first year PhD student under the supervision of Prof Satheesh Krishnamurthy (http://www.open.ac.uk/people/sk9268) and Prof Nicholas Braithwaite (http://www.open.ac.uk/people/nsjb2) and Prof Vasant Kumar - Cambridge University (https://www.msm.cam.ac.uk/people/kumar). Her research is primarily focused on application of plasma-functionalized 2D layered materials for waste water treatment with cross-country applications focusing particularly on the lives of children who die from exposure to contaminated water in rural and urban Ghana. She is working in the Energy research group working on plasma functionalization of 2D layered materials for waste water treatment in Ghana with the aim of providing cross cutting research that tends.
Contact: lois.damptey@open.ac.uk
Sreeganesh Sathiyapriyan (Graduate Intern)
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Sreeganesh research work focusses on hydrophobic coating for NHS health applications and also commissioning of remote solar lab
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Manan Mehta
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Manan's research primarily focussed on the synthesis and characterisation of Bismuth vanadate coreshell nanoparticles, TiO2/MoS2 composites and TiO2 graphene systems for photocatalytic applications. He used XPS, microscopy and electrochemical methods to understand the fundamental properties of materials for the application of hydrogen generation from waste water.
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Shalini Nagabooshanam (external supervisor)
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Shalini's research was on design of electrochemical bio-sensors on microfluidic platform using metal oxide functional materials for organophosphate detection.
She studied thin films of Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs) for detection of Organo-Phosphates (OPs) and copper oxide quantum for sensing applications owing to their good electrical conductivity, chemically active nature, etc.
International visiting academics
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Professor Bodhraj Mehta, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, India
(periodical visitor to our lab) - collaboration on solar cells and photocatalysis.
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Associate Professor Surendra Kumar Martha, Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad, India- UKIERI and Royal Academy of Engineering Industry Academia grant on recycling of Lithium ion batteries.
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Professor Dermot Brabazon, Dublin City University, Ireland
(periodical visitor) residual stress, carbon and 2D composites for several applications, MXene and its composites)
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Professor Franco Amado, Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz , Brazil - Prof Amado, spent one year through science without borders fellowship and was working on the integration of 2D materials in to pAni fibres for energy from waste applications
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Professor Daniel Bertuol, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Brazil - Professor Bertuol spent one year in our lab researching on new methods to recycle lithium ion batteries and functionalisation of nano fibres for e-waste.
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Professor Amit K Chakraborty, National Institute of Technology, Durgapur, India - Professor Chakraborty is a frequent visitor to our lab, and was involved in joint UKIERI grant on graphene and 2D materials functionalisation for DSSC solar cells.
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Professor V Ramamurthy, PSG College of Technology, India- Professor Ramamurthy visited our lab and other academics on a Royal Academy of Engineering project for textile waste water treatment through biological processes.
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Associate Professor Gautam Dalapati, SRM University, Global Challenges Research Fund, hybrid solar cells for domestic applications
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Associate Professor S Venkataprasad Bhat, SRM Institute of Technology- Royal Society grant, flexible solar cells
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Visiting Students and Postdocs
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Dr. Naresh Vengapally, IIT Hyderabad- Recycling of batteries and super capacitors - UKIERI DST project
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Dr. Nilanjan Chakaraborty, IIT Bombay - Graphene based flexible solar cells - UKIERI DST project
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Dr. A Sarkar, NIT Durgapur - Graphene based flexible solar cells- UKIERI DST
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Mrs Mohana priya and Ms Shivanisingh Kaur, PSG College of Technology, India - Royal Academy of Engineering project, on biomaterials for dye treatment.
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Dr. Emer Duffy, University of Tasmania - Carbon onions and its functionalisation
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Dr. Lily He, Dublin City University, Main focus is on development of novel porous graphitic nano-templated carbon monolithic sorbents in the uses of separation science
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Dr. Komal Bagga, Dublin City University and NASA AMES Lab, Nanoparticle functionalized laser patterned substrate: an innovative route towards low cost biomimetic platforms
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Dr. Dhanasekar, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, India - CZTS flexible solar cells
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