Suman Chakraborty (born 10 August 1983) is anIndianacademic who is currently serving as thedirector ofIIT Kharagpur since June 2025. He is also a Sir J. C. Bose National Fellow (bestowed by the Ministry of Science and Technology,Government of India).[1][2]
Chakraborty completed his undergraduate studies in Mechanical Engineering fromJadavpur University in 1996. After a brief industrial experience, he joined the Masters of Engineering (ME) programmeIndian Institute of Science (IISc), on securing the 1st Rank in the Nationally conducted Graduate Aptitude Test for Engineering (GATE-1997). In his ME program, he emerged as the faculty topper and received gold medal and Senate Commendation for outstanding performance. In 1999, he joinedJadavpur University as a lecturer, a position he held until 2002, while concurrently beginning his doctoral research at IISc in 2000. He received his Ph.D. in 2002, and was bestowed with the Institute level best-thesis award as well as "Best International CFD Thesis Award", for his work on solid-liquid phase transition during thermal processing of materials.
Chakraborty's research interest lies in fundamentals of micro/nano scale fluid dynamics, miniaturization, and its applications focused towards sustainable technology goals for promoting good health and well-being of the underserved.[3] Some notable fundamental discoveries emerging from his research endeavours include: surface roughness-aided slippery flow,[4][5][6][7] massively-amplified ionic-pumping in highly confined water,[8] sticky-flow of water on nano-engineered hydrophobic interfaces,[9] programmable manoeuvring of tiny droplets along arbitrary preferential directions,[10][11][12] generating controlled microbubbles on portable spinning-disc,[13] reversing thermally-driven spontaneous migration of nano-droplets[14] – defying common scientific intuitions in all cases. Extending his findings on confined-liquids to soft biological matter, he came up with new insights on puzzling anti-biotic resistance in life-threatening infectious diseases. He also introduced niche low-cost bio-inspired fabrication and analytical tools to unveil several hitherto-unresolved mysteries of blood flow in human-body microvasculature, including the collective-dynamics of red blood cells.[15][16][17] He innovated a biomimetic tumour-on-a-chip technology for unleashing the mechanisms of cancer progression, aiding highly-effective drug screening, and throwing light on the efficacy of suggestive therapies.[18][19][20][21]
Chakraborty is the inventor of 'Paper and Pencil Microfluidics' technology - a new class of electrically manipulative miniaturized devices that does not require any sophisticated fabrication facility.[22][23] This emerged as a backbone of manufacturing niche low-cost medical diagnostic devices, as well as facilitating water desalination[24] and energy-harvesting systems on simple paper-strips. By harnessing such spontaneous ion-water interaction in an interlaced fibrous cellulose network, he further demonstrated electrical power generation using wet textiles,[25] drawing analogies with water transpiration in living plants.
Chakraborty is also known for developing disruptive medical diagnostic technologies for the underserved.[26][27][28][29][30] He was the first to put-forward a fundamental design basis for all the present-day point-of-care diagnostic tests that are premised on micro-capillary flow. By analysing the pattern formation in a blood drop on a pre-wetted paper-strip, he put forward a new approach of reagent-free screening of anaemic patients in resource-limited settings. He developed a portable spinning disc to perform a Complete-Blood-Count test with virtually no-resource.[31] He also invented a hand-held blood-perfusion imaging device for early screening of oral pre-cancer and cancer outside structured clinics.[32][18][33] With success in phase-1 clinical trial, this technology is being adapted for risk-assessment in cervical cancer patients as well. His innovation of a new Piecewise Isothermal Nucleic Acid test (COVIRAP) has emerged as the first of its kind highly-accurate molecular-diagnostic technology for infectious disease detection, albeit with the cost and simplicity of a rapid test.[34][35][36][37][38][39][40] This generic platform technology, applicable for several diseases beyond COVID-19, has been certified by regulatory authorities and commercialized for global dissemination.[41][42][43][44][45]
Beyond the ambit of technology development, Chakraborty leads a National-level Common Research and Technology Development Hub (CRTDH) on affordable healthcare, funded by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Government of India.[46][47][48]
Chakraborty has published more than 525 articles in international journals (including interdisciplinary journals such as Advanced Materials, Proceedings of theNational Academy of Sciences - USA,Physical Review Letters, Nano Letters, ACS Nano and articles in journals such as Lab-on-a-Chip, Physical Review, Physics of Fluids and Journal of Fluid Mechanics).[49] Till now 50 Ph.D. students have graduated under his supervision. He has around 25 numbers of patented technologies,.[50] These translated and commercialized technologies include innovations on nucleic acid based point-of-care rapid molecular diagnostic technology (COVIRAP), hand-held oral cancer screening device, paper- and compact-disc based blood test kits, rapid screening platform for antibiotic resistance, among several others.[citation needed]
Beyond his fundamental and translational research, Chakraborty has authored original fundamental texts and monographs in classical as well as emerging areas of scientific and technological pursuit.[51][52][53][54][55][56] He developed several Internationally acclaimed video courses, under the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL).[57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65] He also established a research-inspired teaching lab of microfluidics.
Chakraborty has been awarded the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize; the highest Scientific Award from the Government.[66][67] He has been elected as Fellows of American Physical Society,[68] Royal Society of Chemistry, American Society of Mechanical Engineers,[69] and all the National Academies of Science and Engineering;[70][71][72] recipient of theInfosys Prize in the category of Engineering and Computer Science,[73] G. D. Birla Award for Scientific Research,[74] National Award for Teachers,[75][76] National Academy of Sciences– Reliance Industries Platinum Jubilee Award for Application Oriented Research,[77] Rajib Goyal Prize for Young Scientists,[78] IIT Roorkee Research Awards,[79] Indo-US Research Fellowship, Scopus Young Scientist Award,[80] Young Scientist/ Young Engineer Awards from various National Academies of Science and Engineering, and Outstanding Teacher Award from the National Academy of Engineering.[81] He has been listed among 75 Scientists of India Under 50 years age as recognized by the Department of Science and Technology,[82] and he has also been listed among top-ranked global scientists in fluids and plasma as per an archival research survey from the Stanford University.[83] As perResearch.com, he has been listed as National Rank 1 in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Research.[84] The Asian Scientist Magazine has recognized him as one of Asia's most outstanding researchers, featuring him in their annualAsian Scientist 100 list.[85] He has also been a Humboldt Fellow.[86]
Chakraborty has received research grants from Government and premiere International funding agencies (British Council, Royal Academy of Engineering-UK, Indo-US Science and Technology Forum, NSF- USA, JSPS-Japan). He has also been a consultant to industries such as General Motors, Delphi, INTEL, SHELL, Tata Steel, ITC, ANSYS.[87] His own start-up envisions novel diagnostic technologies towards fostering healthy life with no distinction between the haves and have-nots.[88]
Indian