Prof. Pranab Sarkar received his PhD from Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, Kolkata, India in 1997. After pursuing his postdoc- toral research in the University of Montreal, Canada, Dr. Sarkar started his professional career in the Dept. of Chemistry, Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India in the year 1999. He also served as a visiting Scientist at the University of Saarland, Germany during the period of 2001-2003. Presently, he is a Professor in the Dept. of Chemistry, Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan. Professor Sarkar is an expert in the field of Computational Materials Science and his primary research interest is to employ state of the art theoretical methods to understand and predict material properties at nanoscale. He has made significant contributions to the identification of suitable materials for green sustainable energy and also for spintronic applications. He has published more than 165 papers in internationally reputed journals and a number of book chapters and reviews. Prof. Sankar Prasad Bhattacharyya is fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences and spent three years (2012-2015) in the Dept. of Chemistry, IIT Bombay as Raja Ramanna Fellow, Department of Atomic Energy, GOI. He retired as Senior Professor of Physical Chemistry, Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS), Kolkata. Presently he is a visiting Professor at the School of Chemical Sciences, IACS Uni- versity, Kolkata, India. His main research interest is in the area of quantum chemistry and his distinguished career in the theoretical chemistry spans a period of over 35 years. His work on the development of new computational techniques, with particlular focus on global opti- mizations, for the treatment of complex problems in molecular chemistry and physics is well documented by an impressive list of highly influential publications in the field, devoted both to traditional mathematical techniques and more recently, to soft computing-oriented approaches. He has supervised more than 20 PhD and 30 undergraduate project students. His publications included more than 200 papers in peer-reviewed journals and a number of book chapters.
