(4dg) Advanced and Functional Nanoporous Materials for Novel Applications

My overall research interests incorporate engineered porous materials and their wide scientific and technological applications. I like to design the shape and direction of my research area in such a way that it can born with the knowledge and skill that I have acquired during my previous research experience and can translate in to a more advanced and wide spectrum of research scope to respond to the increasingly complex scientific and technical challenges of the 21^stcentury. It is also of utmost importance to me to carefully design the research areas in such a way that it can provide a broad understanding of science and engineering and develop the experimental skills needed by the student and researchers for their future independent work.

The major theme of my research work in the academic and national laboratory sectors has been related to the nanoporous materials and their applications in energy, environmental, and biological sectors. During the pursuit of my doctoral degree, I worked on the synthesis and characterization of nanoporous media for the adsorption and separation of hydrogen, carbon dioxide and several other gases followed by adsorptive water purification to remove fluorides and microorganisms from drinking water. After my short postdoctoral research in University of Quebec at Trios Rivieres, Canada, where I mostly studied the synthesis of nanoporous metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), I began my research at ORNL on the studies of adsorption by neutron and x-ray scattering along with design and synthesis and of structural carbon based adsorbents and their applications in electrode materials and controlled delivery of drugs and related materials. Based on my research, I published a large volume of peer reviewed publications (mostly as first author), presented in several conference proceedings and filed a U.S. patent.

 My overarching goal of research as a faculty member is case-specific design and synthesis of novel adsorbents and their functional applications. Typically, I would like to employ amphiphilic surfactant templating on various natural and synthetic precursors along with post-synthesis modifications to design highly engineered nanoporous carbons with tunability and nano-scale control of their pore morphology. The unique feature of the designed nanoporous carbons is expected to be case-specific design and a universal control of pore architecture which will provide their applications in myriad scientific and engineering fields. I would be interested to seek their applications in three different sectors: (a) Gas separation and storage by employing both size exclusion and guest species involvement within the nanopores of carbon (b) Electrode materials for batteries and supercapacitors (c) Storage and controlled release of functional molecules from carbon nanopores, including drugs, enzymes, proteins and genetic species.

Total peer-reviewed publications accepted: 30; Under Review: 4; Total citations: 380; h-index: 11                      

Selected publications:

1)      N.C. Gallego, L. He, D. Saha, Y. Melnichenko, C. I. Contescu, J. Am. Chem. Soc. vol. 133, no. 35, pp 13794-13797, 2011.

2)      D. Saha, S. Deng, J. Physical Chemistry Letters vol.1, no. 1, pp 73-78, 2009.

3)      D. Saha, Z. Bao, F. Jia, S. Deng, Environmental Science and Technology vol. 44, no. 5, pp 1820-1826, 2010.

4)      D. Saha, C.I. Contescu, N.C. Gallego, Langmuir vol. 28, no. 13, pp. 5669-5677.

5)      D. Saha, S. Deng, Langmuir vol. 25, no. 21, pp. 12550-12560, 2009.

6)      D. Saha, S. Deng, Langmuir vol. 26, no. 11, pp 8414-8418, 2010.

7)      D. Saha, S. Deng, Langmuir  vol. 27, no. 11, pp 6780-6786, 2011.

8)      D. Saha, S. Deng, Carbon vol. 48, no. 12, pp 3471-3476, 2010.

9)      D. Saha, S. Deng, Carbon vol. 48, no. 12, pp 3471-3476, 2010.

10)  C. I. Contescu, D. Saha, N. Gallego,  A. Kolesnikov, E. Mamontov, Carbon vol. 50, no. 3, pp 1071-1082, 2011.

11)  D. Saha, C.I. Contescu, N.C. Gallego, Microporous and Mesoporous Materials vol. 155, pp 71-74, 2012.

12)  D. Saha, Z. Wei, S. Deng, Separation and Purification Technology vol. 64, no. 3. pp. 280-287, 2008.

13)  D. Saha, Z. Wei, S. Deng, Intl. J. Hydrogen Energy vol. 33, no. 24, pp. 7479-7488, 2008.

14)  D. Saha, S. Deng, Journal of Chemical and Engineering Data vol. 54, no. 8, pp. 2245-2250, 2009.

Patent Filed: A.K. Naskar and D. Saha, Lignin derived porous carbon composition, method of preparation, and use thereof. U.S. Patent Filed; Application No. 13/766,292, 2013.