Prof. Ashutosh Sharma is a visionary academician who has made some exceptional interdisciplinary contributions in nanosciences and nanotechnology fields. Since January 2015, he has been serving as the Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India where he has helped in initiating several new programs related to infrastructure and human capacity building, innovation and startups, R&D in advanced manufacturing, waste processing, clean energy and cyber-physical systems, industry-academia cooperation, science communication, women scientists and initiated major international collaborations in the areas of priority for the nation.

Prof. Sharma received his B.Tech. in Chemical Engineering from IIT Kanpur in 1982. In 1983, he obtained his master’s from Pennsylvania State University and later joined the doctoral program at the State University of New York, Buffalo, and obtained a Ph.D. under the supervision of Prof. Eli Ruckenstein in 1987. For the next three years, he worked as a research scientist with the Department of Ophthalmology, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, State University of New York. In 1991, he moved back to India and joined IIT Kanpur as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering. He later served as Head, Chemical Engineering from 2003 to 2005.

Prof. Sharma’s research contributions are highly interdisciplinary, spanning a wide range of nanotechnology areas: carbon based nanocomposites and MEMS/NEMS in energy, health and environment, functional interfaces, mechanics of soft matter, nano-patterning and nanofabrication, colloid and interfacial engineering, biomaterials & bio surfaces, wetting, adhesion and thin polymer films. He has made original contributions to the understanding of the behavior of thin films and other highly confined nanoscale systems. He has explained the instability and evolution of morphology of thin films on homogeneous substrates by 3D nonlinear stability theory and experiments. He has proposed a new theory for de-wetting of thin films on heterogeneous and patterned substrates leading to a novel method for the small-scale patterning of polymer films by templating. His works on nano-fabrication using carbon based materials have led to the development of hierarchical micro to nano structures which are expected to have applications in energy storage devices, sensors in the domain of health care, filtration and so on. He has, so far, published 350 peer reviewed papers, filed over 15 patents, given over 150 invited or key note conference presentations and mentored a successful nanotechnology start-up.

Prof. Sharma is a recipient of numerous national and international honor and awards including the prestigious Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar award (2002) in engineering sciences for his “original pioneering contribution to the understanding of the behavior of thin films and other highly confined nanoscale systems". He is also the recipient of the UNESCO medal for outstanding contributions to the development of nanoscience and nanotechnologies (2017), Distinguished alumni award, State University of New York, SUNY Buffalo (2016), In 2010, the Infosys Science Foundation awarded him with the Infosys Prize in Engineering and Computer Science for his “scholarly scientific contributions in the broad areas of nanoscale surface pattern evolution, instability, and the dynamics of thin liquid and solid films and soft matter.” Prof. Sharma was bestowed with the TWAS Prize in the engineering sciences (2008) for his fundamental contributions to meso-mechanics, instabilities and self-organization in soft thin films; meso-patterning; wetting; adhesion and interfacial interactions, .” In, 2007, he received the IIT Kanpur Distinguished Alumnus Award and in 2006, the inaugural Bessel Research Award of the Humboldt Foundation. Other special awards include Homi J. Bhabha Award (2007) for Applied Sciences, University Grants Commission (UGC), Kapsita Gold Medal from Russian Academy of Natural Sciences (2010), Firodia award (2017), Herdillia award (2003), J. C. Bose National Fellowship, DST (2006), National Hari Om Ashram Trust Awards (2007) and R. C. Mehrotra Memorial Lifetime Achievement Award (2010). He is an elected fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, National Academy of Sciences and Indian Academy of Sciences. He has also been an INAE Chair Professor from 2011 to 2013, and C. V. Seshadri Chair Professor, 2012.

IIT Kanpur takes great pride in honouring Professor Ashutosh Sharma as an Institute Fellow

Prof. Vishwanath Sinha was born on January 07, 1943 at Bhagalpur, Bihar and did his B.Sc. Engineering in Telecommunication from Bihar Institute of Technology Sindri (then under Ranchi University) and MS and D.Sc. from University of Ljubljana (pronounced as Lyublyana), Slovenia. He joined the Institute on December 15, 1971 as an Assistant Professor jointly in the Advanced Centre for Electronic Systems (ACES) and Electrical Engineering and superannuated on January 31, 2005. During his more than three decades of service, besides his various academic roles he also served the Institute in several capacities, notably as a Warden, Advisor Administration, Professor-in-charge Students’ Affairs (DOSA), JEE Chairman, Head of the Department, and as Deputy Director for more than two terms.

On leave of absence he was a Researcher at INPE (Brasilian Space Research Institute), Sao Jose dos Campos, Brasil; a Visiting Professor at University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez Campus, USA; and several short assignments as a Guest Professor at RWTH-Aachen University of Technology, Germany; and also as a Visiting Professor at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland.

As a faculty member of ACES he was involved in several R&D projects like ‘cutter rejection platform’, ‘troposcatter communication system’ and ‘defence digital satellite communication’ of which, he was the coordinator. He was also the principal investigator for GIST (Graphics and Indian Script Terminals). Yet another project was the Nationally Coordinated Telematics Project of MHRD run at all the (then) five IITs and IISc Bangalore. He was the National Coordinator of the JTG (Joint Telematics Group) from 1992 till 2003.

During his stay in IIT Kanpur he organised several national and international conferences. As a part of the JTG activity the group organised ‘National Conference in Communication’ (NCC) in 1995 and at the start of next cycle again in 2001. This Conference, a leading one in the country in area of ‘communication and networking’ is organised every year by rotation in the five IITs and IISc. He was quite active in technical societies and had held the position of Council Member of IETE, Chairman of IETE Kanpur Centre, Chairman of IE(I) Kanpur Centre and Chairman of IEEE UP Section. He is a Life Fellow of all these Societies.

He was the Founding Director of the LNM-IIT Jaipur, first ever public-private University in the country, set up by Government of Rajasthan and the Foundation of Mr LN Mittal. He continued there as a Distinguished Professor and Advisor after his term as Director was over. Subsequently he was an Emeritus Professor at MNIT Jaipur and later became Academic Chair of E & ICT. He continues to be associated with the Academy in a honorary capacity.

In Recognition of his significant contributions to this Institute, IIT Kanpur is pleased to confer upon Prof. Vishwanath Sinha, the Institute Fellow for the year 2020.

IIT Kanpur takes great pride in honouring Professor Vishwanath Sinha as an Institute Fellow.

A 1971 B. Tech. graduate in Chemical Engineering from IIT Kanpur, Mr. Umang Gupta has positively impacted the world around him on multiple dimensions. He has been a pioneer and leader in enterprise software for mini-computers, personal computers and the Internet and mobile platforms. He has transformed multiple IIT alumni organisations globally. From his home in San Mateo, California, Mr. Gupta has been engaged his local community in Silicon Valley and remains a devoted husband to Ruth, proud father to Anjali and Kashi and three grandchildren.

After completing his MBA from Kent State University and working for IBM, Mr. Gupta moved to California and was asked by Larry Ellison to write the first business plan for Oracle Corporation in 1981.

Later, Mr. Gupta’s work ushered in the era of Client-Server computing via Gupta Technologies, a software company that he founded in 1984 and led to a successful IPO in 1993, thus becoming the first Indian American to take a software company public on the NASDAQ. After exiting that company, he became the Chairman, CEO and largest shareholder of Keynote Systems, an Internet measurement and testing startup that he built into one of the world’s first Software-as-a-Service (SAaS) companies and which he took public in 1999. Keynote acquired 14 other companies over the next 15 years until it was sold to a private equity firm.

When IIT Kanpur alumni in California banded together to establish the IITK Foundation as a non-profit charity in 2000, Mr. Gupta graciously agreed to be its founding chairperson and expanded its reach across the United States. He donated significant funds to the Foundation and his leadership enabled many others to commit to funding and growing the foundation. After the 50th anniversary of the IIT System, alumni from Bombay, Delhi, Guwahati, Kharagpur and Madras rallied with Kanpur graduates to support him as the founding chairman Pan IIT USA, Inc. Pan IIT Global was created as a loose affiliation of IIT Alumni organizations in Canada, India, Europe, the United States and other parts of the world. Mr. Gupta also served as its chairperson from 2009 to 2016.

As a philanthropist, Mr. Gupta served on the board of what is now the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, which has raised billions of dollars for regional and national causes in the United States. In addition, Ruth and he were donors to, and served as board members of PARCA, a California non-profit organization that serves the developmentally disabled and their families. He served on the board of the Smithsonian Institution’s Asian Pacific American Center, and as Chairman of the San Mateo County History Museum where he and Ruth have attended the Immigrants Gallery celebrating the contributions of immigrants to California from all over the world.

IIT Kanpur takes great pride in honouring Mr. Umang Gupta as an Institute Fellow.