Ranganathan Shashidhar | |
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| Born | (1946-01-01)1 January 1946 (age 80) Karnataka, India |
| Alma mater | |
| Known for | Studies onLiquid crystals |
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| Scientific career | |
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Ranganathan Shashidhar (born 1 January 1946) is a US-based Indian condensed matter physicist and a former head of theLaboratory for Molecularly Engineered Materials and Surface of the Center for Biomolecular Science & Engineering, a division of theUnited States Naval Research Laboratory.Known for his research onliquid crystals, Shashidhar is an elected fellow of theIndian Academy of Sciences and the senior vice president of Polestar Technologies, a US-based company involved in the development of sensing technologies. TheCouncil of Scientific and Industrial Research, the apex agency of the Government of India for scientific research, awarded him theShanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology, one of the highest Indian science awards, for his contributions to Physical Sciences in 1984.[1][note 1]
Born on 1 January 1946, Shashidhar did his college education at theUniversity of Mysore from where he obtained bachelor's and master's degrees before securing a PhD from the same institution.[2] Subsequently, he took up the position of a faculty member at his alma mater in 1971 and later, moved toRaman Research Institute as a scientist and professor.[3] Before joiningUnited States Naval Research Laboratory in 1993, he held various positions such as that of a visiting professor atRuhr University Bochum (1983–87),Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1988–93) andGeorgetown University, of a visiting scientist atAT&T Labs and of a senior scientist at Geo Centers Inc. He headed theLaboratory for Molecularly Engineered Materials and Surfaces at NRL. He has also been associated withScience Applications International Corporation (SAIC) and is a senior vice president of Polestar Technologies, leading their research and technology division.[4]
Shashidhar studies modern condensed matter physics including reentrantpolymorphism andmulticritical points[5] His studies in condensed matter physics include the subfield ofliquid crystals and he has contributed to widening the understanding of their behavior at high temperatures,[6] He led a team of scientists who developed a family of electroclinic liquid crystals with 256greyscales and a fast enough response time, less than 100 microseconds, that allows their use in high resolution hand-held devices.[3] He is also credited with the demonstration of the firstfullymultiplexed plastic display with 25,000 addressable pixels.[3] His studies have been documented by way of a book,Liquid Crystal Materials Devices and Applications[7] and a number of articles[8][note 2] and the article repository of Indian Academy of Sciences has listed 40 of them.[9] He holds patents for many processes[10][note 3] and his work has drawn citations from other scientists.[11][12][13][14] He is a former member of the board of directors ofInternational Liquid Crystal Society, executive committee of International High Pressure Association and the editorial board ofLiquid Crystals journal ofTaylor & Francis.[3]
The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research awarded him theShanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize, one of the highest Indian science awards in 1984.[15] He was elected by theIndian Academy of Sciences as their fellow in 1988.[16] In 1999, the team led by him received the Federal Laboratory Consortium Award for excellence in technology transfer.[17] He is also a recipient of Alan Berman Publication Awards thrice and Edison Patent Award once, both awards given by the US Naval Research Laboratory.[3]
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