Dr. Imalka Munaweera is a winner of the 2021 OWSD-Elsevier Foundation Award for Early-Career Women Scientists in the Developing World for her research in Chemistry, Mathematics, and Physics especially for her research contribution to the nanotechnology related projects. Currently, she is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Chemistry at University of Sri Jayewardenepura in Sri Lanka. She has over 10+ years of teaching experience in Nanotechnology, Application of Nanotechnology, Inorganic Chemistry, Polymer Chemistry, and Instrumental Analysis. She has over 15+ years of research experience in the field of Nanotechnology, Inorganic Chemistry, and Material Sciences, as well as in instrumentation (AFM, SEM-EDX, and TEM-EDX, FTIR, Raman, DLS, SQUID, etc.). She obtained her PhD in Chemistry at The University of Texas at Dallas, USA in 2015. She has served as an Assistant Professor in Chemistry, A&M University, Prairie view, Texas, USA. She was a Postdoctoral Researcher at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, USA. She was also a Graduate Research/Teaching Assistant in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Texas at Dallas, Texas, USA during her graduate studies. Further, she was a Scientist at Sri Lanka Institute of Nanotechnology, Sri Lanka in her early career. Her research interests are nanotechnology for drug delivery/ pharmaceutical applications, agricultural applications and water purification applications. Furthermore, she also pursues research towards development of nanomaterials from natural resources for various industrial applications. She has authored over 20 publications in indexed journals and is also an inventor of 4 US granted patents, two Sri Lankan granted patents (licensed and commercialized) and an international patent related to nanoscience and nanotechnology-based research. Further, she is a recipient of many awards related to nanoscience and nanotechnology research. In addition, she is a principal investigator (PI) for a research grant which was awarded by World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) and a core PI for two more grants (NRC PPP and TWAS). From being awarded many accolades in both the U.S and Sri Lanka, including scholarships, she has also taken part in paper review and many conference presentations and contributed to abstract awards as well. Some of her awards include the National Science & Technology Award in Sri Lanka in 2010 under the category of innovative advanced technologies with commercial potential that was awarded by the President of Sri Lanka and several graduate competition awards awarded by the American Chemical Society. Ms. Chamalki Madhusha is a graduate research assistant and she has obtained her BSc degree in Chemistry from the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka. Currently, she is working towards a sustainable future through green chemistry and nanotechnology-based findings. Her research interests include materials chemistry, food chemistry, green chemistry, and nanotechnology with high-impact journal publications. She is engaged in generating new research ideas and devising feasible solutions to broadly relevant problems. She is an author of eight indexed publications, two local and international patents and four international conference abstracts.
