People in the department
Dr Bala Vaidhyanathan
Senior Lecturer
DIS Industrial Placement Coordinator
Associate Dean for Enterprise, School of AACME
BSc, MSc, PhD, FHEA, MIMMM, MACerS
Tel: 01509 223152
Fax: 01509 223949
Email: B.Vaidhyanathan@Lboro.ac.uk
Background
Bala (also known as Vaidhy) attained a B.Sc in Physics from Bharathiar University and an M.Sc in Materials Science from PSG College of Technology and a Ph.D in Solid State & Structural Chemistry from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. He spent three years Post Doctoral Fellowship at the Materials Research Laboratory of the Pennsylvania State University, USA and then joined Loughborough University, UK as a Senior Research Associate. He worked as a Lead-Scientist in General Electric Corporation - Global Research (GE-GRC) between 2004-06 before joining the Department of Materials as a Lecturer in September 2006.
Qualifications
- BSc, Bharathiar University
- MSc, PSG college of Technology
- PhD, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India.
- FHEA, MIMMM, MACerS
Key awards
- Awarded K.P. Abraham Gold Medal for Best Doctoral Thesis from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore,1998
- Twice the recipient of the Inventor Incentive Award by the Penn State Research Foundation, 2000 & 2002
- Bronze Medal for Innovation from GE Global Research Corporation, 2006.
- Glory of India Award from The India International Friendship Society for contributions in the field of Science, Technology and Education for the year 2010.
Current teaching responsibilities
- MPP353 Electronic Materials
- MPA020 Engineering Materials
- MPA102 Experimentation
- MPC102 Fracture and Failure
- MPP137 Overview of Packaging Materials
- MPP141 Materials Selection for Design
Current administrative responsibilities
- DIS Industrial Placement Coordinator
- Associate Dean for Enterprise, School of Aeronautical, Automotive, Chemical and Materials Engineering (AACME)
Outline of main research interests
- Ceramics, Nanocrystalline materials, Electroceramics, Microwave processing, Microwave-materials interactions
- Glasses, Functional coatings, SOFCs
- Non-Si Photovoltaics and Hydrogen generation, Ceramics for bio-medical applications
- Powder synthesis, Sol-gel methods
- Smart materials for sensing, security and sports
Recent publications
36 Journal and peer-reviewed conference papers, 9 international patents have been published in the last 5 years including:
- Saremi-Yarahmadi, S., Tahir, A.A., Vaidhyanathan, B. and Wijayantha K.G. U., ''Fabrication of nanostructured a-Fe2O3 electrodes using Ferrocene for Solar Hydrogen Generation'', Materials Letters, 63, 2009, p 523-526.
- Vaidhyanathan, B, Annapoorani, K, Binner, J.G.P, Raghavendra, R., “Large –scale Microwave Assisted Processing of Multilayer Electroceramic Devices”, Ceramics Eng. and Sci. Proceedings, Published by the American Ceramics Society, V30(8), 2009, p 11-18.
- Binner, J.G.P. and Vaidhyanathan, B., ''When Should Microwaves Be Used to Process Technical Ceramics?'', Materials Science Forum, 606, 2008, p 51-59.
- Binner, J.G.P. and Vaidhyanathan, B., ''Processing of Bulk Nanostructured Ceramics'', Journal of the European Ceramic Society, 28, 2008, p 1329-1339.
Current and recent grants and contracts (with others)
16 grants totalling £1.5M over the last five years including;
- 2008-2011 Nanostructured Advanced Ceramics (NASTRAC), TSB/EPSRC, £259.9k
- 2009-2012 Ultra High Temperature Ceramics, DSTL/MoD, £354.1k
- 2009-2013 Understanding and Improving Ceramic Armour Materials, EPSRC, £415.9k
- 2011-2014 Zirconia Ceramics as an enabling material for biomedical implants (ZIRCIMP), TSB, £210k
External collaborators
- Syfer Technology Ltd
- Dynamic Ceramic
- MEL Chemicals
- Rolls Royce
- Cochlear
- Littelfuse Ireland Ltd.
- Morgan Advanced Ceramics
- BorgWarner BERU Systems
External roles and appointments
Editorial board membership of Journal of Materials: Design and Applications; Webmaster & Member, IoM3 Ceramic Science Committee, 2007 –present; Member, American and Indian Ceramics Societies, 2004-present, Member, Association for Microwave Power Research and Education in Europe (AMPERE) 2003 – present; Associate Fellow, Institute of Nanotechnology; Member, Structural Ceramics Network (SCERN) & Materials KTN - UK, 2007 - present
Additional information
Co-ordinating the Loughborough-Asia Materials Partnership (LAMP) programme to promote teaching & research links with India.
Full list of publications
Loughborough CIS Portal: Publications list