Dr. Dnyanesh Vernekar

Research Experience during Post Doc (Ongoing)

Rechargeable batteries such as LIBs/NIBs meeting economic and ecological sustainability criteria are highly desirable as a solution to energy crisis and controlling Greenhouse gas pollution. His present work involves the interplay of disorder and doping in Titanates influencing electrochemical Li/Na insertion in Li/Na ion batteries. He is also working on understanding the structural parameters in Covalent Organic Frameworks (COF) (anodes) and Lithium Cobalt Phosphates (cathodes) required for implementation in LIBs/NIBs. He has studied the activity of NMC 532 & NMC-111 cathodes and also the influence of additives on graphite for lithium ion batteries.

Research Experience during PhD

Thesis Title :Reactivity of Metal Oxyhydroxides for Organic Tandem Conversions

Multi-step reactions are often encountered in organic synthesis wherein catalysts are required for each step of a reaction in the sequence. Sometimes, the catalysts required in successive steps of a sequence could not only be different but also chemically incompatible with each other (e.g. acid and base). In this context, my research work involved presenting a hypothesis that inorganic metastable phases such as Metal Oxyhydroxides MO(OH) (Where M is a transition metal) which are abundant with surface -OH groups are ideal acid base bifunctional catalysts as they are robust, inexpensive and easily scalable.

Experimental work involved

· Synthesis and characterization of a number of metal oxyhydroxide materials

· Exploring the use of various Metal oxyhydroxides as active acid—base/ redox-base bifunctional catalysts.

· Identifying the origin of bifunctional activity in catalysis using spectroscopic and chemisorption techniques

· Modify these active sites to improve the overall versatility of MO(OH) as a catalyst.

Salient outcome of my research work were

· Showing for the first time the acid-base catalytic activity in MO(OH).

· Showing the polymorph dependent bifunctional catalytic activity

· Role of H2O in the acid-base activity

· Extending the bifunctional activity beyond acid-base to redox-base catalysis

· Conclusive experimental evidences were provided to establish the nature of active sites. i) Acidity in metal oxyhydroxides: surface hydroxyl groups (-OH) & Lewis acidic metal centers

ii) Basicity in metal oxyhydroxides: deprotonated surface hydroxyl group (O-) and oxide ion (O2-)

iii) Redox in metal oxyhydroxides: metal centers existing in variable oxidation states

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