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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY
INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY MADRAS
DR. T. SENTHILKUMAR
Assistant Professor+91-44-22574209
CYB 318, Department of Chemistry Indian Institute of Technology Madras Chennai- 600036 INDIA
Education
Biography
Dr. Senthilkumar joined the Department of Chemistry at the Indian Institute of Technology
(IIT) - Madras, in August - 2026, where he is currently Assistant professor.
He earned his Ph.D. in Polymer Chemistry from the CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory
(CSIR-NCL) in Pune under the supervision of Prof. S. K. Asha. Subsequently, he held his
postdoctoral position as Presidential International Postdoctoral (PIFI) Fellow at the Institute
of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ICCAS) in Beijing, China, under the
mentorship of Prof. Shu Wang.
During his doctoral and postdoctoral career, Dr. Senthilkumar’s research focused on the
design and synthesis of functional conjugated polymers for fluorescence sensing, biological
imaging, and targeted drug delivery. His Ph.D. work introduced novel methodologies for the
fluorescence sensing of bilirubin, enantioselective sensing and separation of enantiomers, and
the detection of metal ions within living cells.
In 2019, Dr. Senthilkumar began his independent academic career as a Scientist-C at the
CSIR-Indian Institute of Petroleum (CSIR-IIP) in Dehradun, where he was subsequently
promoted to Scientist-D in 2023. During his tenure at CSIR-IIP until August 2026, he
successfully guided three Ph.D. students and aligned his research initiatives with national,
industrial and scientific priorities.
Research Interests
Honors and Recognitions
Representative Publications
- Dua, S.; Arora, N.; Prakashaiah, B. G*.; Choudhary, V.; Kumar, P.; Senthilkumar, T*. Corrosion inhibition of mild steel using N 1 , N 2 -bis[4- (dimethylamino)benzyl]ethane-1,2-diamine with synergistic interaction of KI. J. Ind. Eng. Chem. 2026, 154, 762-778. DOI: 10.1016/j.jiec.2025.07.041.
- Arora, N.; Yadav, O.; Dua, S.; Singh, S. K.; Palla, V. C. S.; Senthilkumar, T*. Pinecone-Derived Biocarbon-Polylactic Acid Composites for Sustainable 3D Printing. ACS Appl. Bio Mater. 2025, 8(11), 9741-9753, Front cover article. DOI:10.1021/acsabm.5c00971.
- Joshi, V.; Kumar, K.; Verma , A. K.; Kala, N.; Senthilkumar, T*. Glycerol-Derived Polyester: Its Application in Bitumen Modification With Exploration of Monomer Synergies Using Ridge-Regularized Regression. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2025, 142, e57452. DOI: 10.1002/app.57452
- Senthilkumar, T.; Zhou, L.; Gu , Q.; Liu, L.; Lv , F.; Wang, S. Conjugated Polymer Nanoparticles with Appended Photo-Responsive Units for Controlled Drug Delivery, Release, and Imaging. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2018, 57, 13114. DOI: 10.1002/anie.201807158.
- Senthilkumar, T.; Asha, S. K*. Selective and Sensitive Sensing of Free Bilirubin in Human Serum Using Water-Soluble Polyfluorene as Fluorescent Probe. Macromolecules 2015, 48, 3449. DOI: 10.1021/acs.macromol.5b00043.
- Senthilkumar, T.; Asha, S. K*. An easy ‘Filter-and-Separate’ method for enantioselective separation and chiral sensing of substrates using a biomimetic homochiral polymer. Chem. Commun., 2015, 51, 8931-8934. DOI: 10.1039/C5CC01532D.
The Department of Chemistry is one of the first Departments to function after the Indian Institute of Technology Madras was founded in 1959