Ram Seshadri

Institute Role
Member of Lighting Solutions Group

Role in Affiliated Centers
Member of the Interdisciplinary Center for Wide Bandgap Semiconductors and the Solid-State Lighting & Energy Center

Research
Ram Seshadri’s research encompasses a number of areas in the chemistry of inorganic materials, including new ways of preparing materials, seeking clues from nature on how to make new high-performance materials,  magnetism in inorganic solids, chemical patterning of inorganic materials on large (micrometer) length scales, and finally, using first principles electronic structure calculations to predict new material properties. In addition to his focus on magnetism, polar materials, and porosity, Seshadri is increasingly contributing to materials for heterogeneous catalysis and for applications in solid-state lighting (semiconductors, phosphors , etc.). He also extensively researches functional (particularly oxide) nanomaterials.

Biography
Ram Seshadri received M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, India. After four years as a post-doctoral fellow in France and Germany, he joined the faculty of the Indian Institute of Science in 1999. He moved to the Materials Department at UC Santa Barbara in 2002 as an Assistant Professor, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2006, and to Professor in 2008. Since 2007, he has also had a dual appointment in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and in 2009, he became the Associate Director of UCSB’s Material Research Laboratory.  Seshadri has served as visiting fellow or professor at a number of institutions in Europe including Trinity College, Cambridge, UK; Ecole Polytechnique and Université de Versailles in France; and Universitat at Mainz, Germany. He is the recipient of a number of awards including a Fellowship of the Royal Society of Chemistry (2010), an American Chemical Society ExxonMobil Solid State Chemistry Faculty Fellowship (2005) and an NSF Career Award (2005). Seshadri is an Associate Editor for the Journal of Materials Chemistry and has authored or co-authored over 170 publications.