Professor Indranil MANNA
Professor Manna is currently the Vice Chancellor of BIT Mesra, Ranchi. He obtained his B. Engg. Degree from Calcutta University (B.E. College) in 1983, M. Tech. from IIT Kanpur in 1984 and PhD from IIT Kharagpur in 1990. He was a Premchand Roychand Scholar (1992) and a Mouat Medal awardee (1999) of Calcutta University. He is an educationist and materials engineer with wide ranging research interests covering phase transformation, structure-property correlation and modeling in new and nanometric metals and ceramics, laser/plasma assisted surface engineering, nano/ferro-fluid and bainitic steel. His studies on amorphous Al-alloys, laser surface engineering of steel/Mg/Al alloys, boundary diffusion-controlled phase transformations, and thermal/magnetic properties of nano/ferro-fluid are highly cited. He teaches subjects related to physical metallurgy and surface engineering. As a guest scientist, he visited different renowned Institutions and Universities abroad like Max Planck Institute at Stuttgart, Technical University of Clausthal, Liverpool University, Nanyang Technological University, NIMS-Japan, Unipress-Poland and University of Ulm. His research exploits have been published in over 300 peer reviewed publications; he has guided 30 doctoral theses and conducted 35 sponsored projects worth over Rs 25 crore as the PI. He is a Fellow of all the national academies of science (INSA, IASc, NASI) and engineering (INAE) in India. He was both a DAAD (1988-90) and Humboldt Fellow (2001-02) in Germany. He was honored as a distinguished alumnus by IIEST Shibpur and IIT Kharagpur. He is a recipient of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) prize for engineering sciences (2014) and was elected a Fellow of TWAS (2015). He is also a Member of the Asia Pacific Academy of Materials. He received the MRSI Medal in 2000, Binani Gold Medal (1999) and G D Birla Gold Medal (2008) of IIM, AICTE Career Award for Young Teachers (1995), and INSA Medal for Young Scientist (1992). He was felicitated by the Ministry of Steel with the Young Metallurgist (1991), Metallurgist of the Year (2002) and National Metallurgist Award (2018). He was the National Coordinator of IMPacting Research INnovation and Technology (IMPRINT), a unique technology development initiative of MHRD during 2015-20. He is a member of the Research Boards of several industry/R&D like RINL, GAIL, BHEL, ARCI, Min of Steel and chairs or serves in several national level committees and boards of DST, DBT, CSIR, SERB, INSA, etc. He serves as a peer reviewer for over a dozen top international scientific journals. Earlier, he served as an expert in NAAC and NBA. He is a former President of the Indian Institute of Metals and Vice President of the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE). University of Kalyani and Kazi Nazrul University have conferred DSc (hc) on him in 2017. He served as the Director of CSIR-CGCRI in Kolkata during 2010-2012 and of IIT Kanpur during 2012-2017. Professor Manna is now the 14th President of INAE since Jan 1, 2021 and is passionately involved in making INAE a national agency for promoting engineering and technological self-reliance of India by translational research, innovation and entrepreneurship.