Dr. Debashis Adhikari
Associate Professor, Chemical Sciences

Email adhikari(AT)iisermohali.ac.in
Phone  +91 9836176798
Fax +91 172 2240124
Personal Page DA Catalysis Group                                                      
Research Area
Catalysis, Small Molecule Activation, M-L Multiple Bonding

Research Focus

Our research focus is in synthetic inorganic and organometallic chemistry with heavy emphasis on small molecule activation and catalysis. We plan to develop ligand architectures which can support transition metals tailored toward unusual transformations relevant to energy and environment. In this respect, we are very interested in developing the catalyst system comprising cheap, abundant, non-toxic base metals instead of their popular heavier congeners. The groups’ endeavor will encompass synthesis, structural and mechanistic understanding (both experimental and computational approach) of the transition metal systems under low-coordinate environment. Students will learn a great deal of air-sensitive manipulations and will also be familiar with a wide array of spectroscopic and analytical techniques including X-ray crystallography, cyclic Voltammetry, multinuclear NMR, EPR, SQUID, MÃssbauer spectroscopies. The electronic structure of the targeted molecules will also be investigated taking guidance from computational investigation


Selected Publications

  • Singh. K.; Vidhyalakshmi S.; Adhikari. D.*Visible light photoredox by a (ph,Ar NacNac)2Zn photocatalyst: photophysical properties and mechanistic understanding. Inorg. Chem. Frontiers, 2021, DOI: 10.1039/D0QI01466D 

  • Bains. A. K.; Yadav. A.; Adhikari. D.*; Pyrenedione-Catalyzed α-Olefination of Nitriles under Visible-Light Photoredox Conditions. Org. Lett. 2021, DOI: 10.1021/acs.orglett.1C00162

  • Sarkar. K.; Das. K.; Kundu. A.; Adhikari. D.*; Maji. B.* Phosphine-Free Manganese Catalyst Enables Selective Transfer Hydrogenation of Nitriles to Primary and Secondary Amines Using Ammonia−Borane. ACS Catal., 2021, 11, 2786−2794.

  • Bains. A. K.; Biswas. A.; Adhikari. D.*; Nickel-Catalysed Chemoselective C-3 Alkylation of Indoles with Alcohols Through a Borrowing Hydrogen Method. Chem. Commun. 2020, 56, 15442—15445.

  • Bhunia, M.; Sahoo, S. R.; Shaw, B. K.; Vaidya. S.; Priyar. A.; Vijaykumar. G.; Adhikari, D. *; Mandal, S. K. * Storing Redox Equivalent in the Phenalenyl Backbone Towards Catalytic Multi-Electron Reduction. Chem. Sci., 2019, 10, 7433.

  • Bains. A. K.; Kundu. A.; Yadav. S.; Adhikari. D.* Borrowing Hydrogen-Mediated N-Alkylation Reactions by a Well-Defined Homogeneous Nickel Catalyst. ACS Catal. 2019, 9, 9051.