Digambara Patra

Assistant Professor

Physical Chemistry and Applied Spectroscopy

B.Sc., Sambalpur University (1994), M.Sc., Sambalpur University (1996),
M.Phil., Sambalpur University (1997), Ph.D., Indian Institute of Technology Madras (2001).

Personal Web Page

Research

Fluorescence based detection has a significant impact in chemistry, biology, and medicine. The ability to manipulate a single molecule in solution and surfaces has been more exciting in the last decade. Fluorescence microscopy, e.g. wide-field, near-field and confocal microscopy, is recently widely used for studying single molecules in ambient environment. Single molecule measurement reveals the distribution of molecular properties in heterogeneous systems and could enable to unearth molecular phenomena which were never explored by ensemble measurements earlier. By applying various advanced fluorescence tools and probing methodology, we develop physical and/or analytical methods to characterize molecular phenomena and use them to sense complicated chemical species. These techniques are also applied for nanoscopic investigations of molecular properties and dynamics of biologically important molecules such as proteins, molecular motors, etc. and to understand various heterogeneous systems like membranes, surfactants, etc. both by ensemble measurements as well as at the individual level.

Selected Publications

• Chemical and biochemical fluorescence sensors, Encyclopedia of Sensors, American Scientific Publishers, California, USA, 2006, 2, 139-156 (with A. K. Mishra).
• Investigation of Polar and Stereoelectronic Effects on Pure Excited-State Hydrogen Atom Abstractions from Phenols and Alkylbenzenes, Photochem. Photobiol., 2006, 82 (1), 310-317 (with Werner M. Nau).
• Defocused imaging of quantum dot angular distribution of radiation, App. Phys. Lett., 2005, 87, 101103 (with Joerg Enderlein).
  
• Performance of fluorescence correlation spectroscopy for measuring diffusion and concentration, ChemPhysChem, 2005, 6, 2324-2336 (with Joerg Enderlein).