IIT Guwahati

Joan-Emma Shea received her B.Sc. with first class honors in from McGill University in MontrŽal, QuŽbec, Canada. She then earned her Ph.D. at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) under the advisement of Professor Irwin Oppenheim. While at MIT, she was awarded a graduate fellowship from the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). Upon graduating from MIT, Dr. Shea was awarded a NSERC postdoctoral fellowship and spent three years at the University of California, San Diego, working jointly with Professors Charles L. Brooks III and JosŽ Onuchic. In 2000, Dr. Shea was hired as an assistant professor with the Department of Chemistry and the James Franck Institute at the University of Chicago. In 2001 she moved to the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 2006, she was promoted to the rank of associate professor and followed that in 2008 with a promotion to full professor. In this time, Dr. Shea was awarded an NSF CAREER award, an Alfred P. Sloan research fellowship, a David and Lucille Packard award, and the Cottage Hospital Biomedical Award.

Dr. Biswarup Pathak is a distinguished Professor in the Department of Chemistry at IIT Indore, India, where he leads the Computational Materials Designing Research Group. His research lies at the intersection of computational modeling, machine learning, and artificial intelligence, focusing on their applications in chemistry and materials science. With over 300 publications in high-impact international journals and more than 8000 citations, Dr. Pathak has made significant contributions to the integration of machine learning techniques in advancing the field of chemistry and materials.

Dr. Raghavan B. Sunoj, is par-excellent Chemistry Professor at IIT Bombay. He is very instrumental in inspiring and motivating the young generation with the excitement of learning and to take up science as a career option. He has been a resource person in several outreach programs such as the ‘teach ten thousand college teachers’ a national-level program. He has actively contributed in taking college level organic chemistry through a problem solving approach to rural India. He has been an active member of summer school programs in theoretical chemistry and organic chemistry. Sunoj has been a recipient of various awards including Prof. S. P. Sukhatme Excellence in Teaching Award, IIT Bombay, 2017 and Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar prize for chemical science in 2019. His students consider him to be one of the best teachers of IIT Bombay.

Elena Besley is Professor of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry at the University of Nottingham, UK and a Royal Society Yusuf Hamied Fellow to India (2025). She also held a Royal Society Wolfson Fellowship awarded to internationally leading outstanding senior scientists to support their research in the UK (2020-24). Elena was appointed as a Lecturer in Theoretical and Computational Chemistry at the University of Nottingham (2011) where she was promoted to Associate Professor (2014) and Professor of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry (2015). Besley’s theoretical and computational work has made a broad general impact across multiple and diverse disciplines in chemical sciences. For her development of theories in charged interactions and their applications Prof Besley received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Electrostatics Society of America (2024). Elena received numerous recognitions including Outstanding Female Scientist and Scholar “AcademiaNet: Profiles of Leading Women Scientists” (2014), EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowship (2008-13), European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant (2013-18), Royal Society Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellowship (2021-22). Her profile was included in the new feature “Physical Chemistry: People and Perspectives” of the 12th edition of Atkins’ Physical Chemistry textbook (2022)

Mihir Jha is currently a Team Lead in Global Editorial Strategy at ACS Publications where he is involved in developing products and services to improve author experience and to drive the influence of ACS Publications journals. Prior to joining ACS in 2021, Mihir earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Indian Institute of Technology Bombay and Masters from Indian Institute of Technology Madras. In the current role, he manages a team of Development Editors who work in collaboration with global ACS staff from different divisions to drive editorial strategy and smooth functioning of editorial workflows.

Dr. Asha Liza James is a Senior Team Lead in Global Editorial Strategy, ACS Publications and is based out of the ACS International India office in New Delhi. Before joining the ACS, she earned her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, where her research was in the domain of nanoscience and materials chemistry. Asha is passionate about improving the author experience and diversity in science. In her current role, Asha manages editorial workflows to support the implementation of publishing strategies and editorial initiatives to sustain and enhance ACS journals’ standing within the global science community.

Sujan Sekhar completed his Bachelor’s and Master of Technology in Chemical Engineering from GIET Univ and MBA from University of Pune. Over the 2 decades Sujan worked to support research community with their information requirements both from society publishers like IET UK/ACS and commercial publishers like Thomson Reuters (now Clarivate). In his role, he has also been responsible for new customer development along with outreach. Sujan along with the team at ACS Publications ensures that researchers across India have a clear understanding of the ACS publications offerings; can access subscribed content to make informed decisions in their day-to-day research activities; and can utilize all resources available to them to support their research.