Chiral Analysis

Professor Polavarapu obtained his Master of Science degree in 1972 from Birla Institute of Technology, Pilani, and earned his Ph. D at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (now renamed as Chennai). He conducted research at the University of Toledo, Toledo, OH, and Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY before joining Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry, where he later became a Professor. Professor Polavarapu has made pioneering contributions in the research areas of specific optical rotation, vibrational Raman optical activity, vibrational circular dichroism, and electronic circular dichroism (collectively referred to as Chiroptical Spectroscopy). His research work led to determination of the absolute configurations of bromochlorofluoromethane and isoflurane (a fluorinated ether used as an anesthetic) for the first time. He has published approximately 260 peer reviewed research papers in leading scientific journals. Professor Polavarapu edited a book entitled “Polarization Division Interferometry” (John Wiley & Sons, 1997) with a contribution from Dr. John Mather, who won the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics; published a solo book “Vibrational Spectroscopy: Principles and Applications with Emphasis on Optical Activity” (Elsevier, 1998); co-edited two volumes on “Comprehensive Chiroptical Spectroscopy” (John Wiley & Sons, 2012), with a contribution from Professor Ben Ferringa, who won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His latest book “Chiroptical Spectroscopy: Fundamentals and Applications” (CRC Press, 2016) was written to serve as a text book for graduate level course. Professor Polavarapu was awarded the Jeffrey Nordhaus Award (in 2010) for excellence in undergraduate teaching at Vanderbilt University. He was elected (in 2012) as a Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS) for distinguished contributions to the field of chiral molecular structure determination. He was an Erudite Scholar (in November 2010) and Distinguished Consulting Research Professor (in 2012) at Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam. He currently serves on the editorial board of Chirality journal.

Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA