IIT Guwahati establishes advanced facilities at first-of-its kind nanotechnology centre

New Delhi: Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati has established advanced micro electronics and nano energy facilities at its Centre for Nanotechnology which is the first-of-its-kind in the Northeast, according to officials. The centre, aimed at meeting future challenges and augmenting academic partnerships with industry in nanotechnology, will carry out multidisciplinary translational research in the fields of health care, nano biomaterials, micro and nano electronics, nano-energy devices and sensors, they said.

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According to officials, the institute has been working in the field of nanotechnology since early 2000 and has a proven record in multiple areas of nanoscience and nanotechnology. Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan inaugurated the new building last month, the construction of which was funded by the income generated by the existing work on nanotechnology at the institute.

"This centre has established state-of-the-art facilities for nanofabrication, with class 100 cleanroom facilities being one of the major attraction, and is poised to make major contributions in the areas of nanodevices development for healthcare, renewable energy-photovoltaics, light-emitting diodes, thin-film transistors, sensors, and other allied areas.

"The faculty and scholars at this centre have demonstrated translational research capability resulting in several technology transfers and establishing few centre for excellences as well," said TG Sitharam, Director, IIT Guwahati.

The centre was funded by the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). It will host 25 state-of-the-art laboratories that will focus on advancements in disciplinary, scientific and translational research and is equipped with cleanroom facilities integrated with state-of-art fabrication, characterisation, and testing laboratories.

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"The centre aspires not only to become one of the major fountain heads of scientific and technological innovation of the country but also in the global scenario. The major targets in this regard would be to establish world-class facilities, publish high-impact research, patent translational research, transfer technology to the industry, and train highly-skilled research scholars who are ready to push the barriers of cutting-edge science and technology," said Dipankar Bandyopadhyay,

Professor, Head, Centre for Nanotechnology, IIT Guwahati. Bandyopadhyay explained that the key outcomes expected from the Centre for Nanotechnology include nano-enabled healthcare, energy harvesting and LED prototypes, devices and technologies.

"The startup and incubation ecosystem plans to nurture at least 25 start-ups in the next three years," he said, adding capacity building of highly skilled manpower in the area of nanofabrication and nanoelectronics and setting up a heath data analytics ecosystem, including rural health and wellness centres, around an electronic health record software and point of care testing devices innovated here are among the outlined plans of the Centre.