Kushal Bagchi received his bachelor’s degree in Chemistry and Biology from St Joseph’s College, Bangalore, and a master’s in chemistry from Pondicherry University. Kushal received his PhD degree in Chemistry in 2020 from UW-Madison under the supervision of Professor Mark Ediger. In his PhD, Kushal worked on the structural characterization of vapor-deposited glasses of organic semiconductors, using synchrotron-based X-ray scattering techniques. Kushal joined PME at the University of Chicago in 2020 as a postdoctoral researcher and currently works under the supervision of Prof. Paul Nealey.
Kushal is currently working on the directed self-assembly in nematic and blue-phase liquid crystals. Kushal’s research involves using defect structures in a liquid-crystalline medium to template the self-assembly of nanoparticles and polymeric precursors. Precisely guiding self-assembly in liquid crystals could have broad implications for applications in optoelectronics and plasmonics.
The Role of Water Volume Fraction on Water Adsorption in Anion Exchange Membranes
Gervasio Zaldivar, Ruilin Dong, Joan M Montes de Oca, Ge Sun, Riccardo Alessandri, Christopher G Arges, Shrayesh N Patel, Paul F Nealey, Juan J de Pablo, Macromolecules, 2025
Role of Crosslinking and Backbone Segmental Dynamics on Ion Transport in Hydrated Anion-Conducting Polyelectrolytes
Zhongyang Wang, Kai Wang, Christopher Eom, Yuxi Chen, Ge Sun, Mincheol Kim, Joan M Montes de Oca, Dongyue Liang, Kushal Bagchi, Shrayesh N Patel, Juan J de Pablo, Paul F Nealey, Advanced Functional Materials, 2025
IEC-Independent Coupling between Water Uptake and Ionic Conductivity in Anion-Conducting Polymer Films
Joan M Montes de Oca, Ruilin Dong, Gervasio Zaldivar, Ge Sun, Zhongyang Wang, Shrayesh N Patel, Paul F Nealey, Juan J de Pablo, Macromolecules, 2025
Water-mediated ion transport in an anion exchange membrane
Zhongyang Wang, Ge Sun, Nicholas HC Lewis, Mrinmay Mandal, Abhishek Sharma, Mincheol Kim, Joan M Montes de Oca, Kai Wang, Aaron Taggart, Alex B Martinson, Paul A Kohl, Andrei Tokmakoff, Shrayesh N Patel, Paul F Nealey, Juan J de Pablo. Nature Communications. 2025.
Directed self-assembly of block copolymer films on atomically-thin graphene chemical patterns
Chang, TH; Xiong, SS; Jacobberger, RM; Mikael, S; Suh, HS; Liu, CC; Geng, DL; Wang, XD; Arnold, MS; Ma, ZQ; Nealey, PF. Directed self-assembly of block copolymer films on atomically-thin graphene chemical patterns. Scientific Reports. 2016. Vol. 6, Pg. 31407.
Directed self-assembly of high-chi block copolymer for nano fabrication of bit patterned media via s
Xiong, S. S. Chapuis, Y. A. Wan, L. Gao, H. Li, X. Ruiz, R. Nealey, P. F.. Directed self-assembly of high-chi block copolymer for nano fabrication of bit patterned media via s. Nanotechnology. 2016. Vol. 27, Pg. 415601.
Directed Self-Assembly of Triblock Copolymer on Chemical Patterns for Sub-10-nm Nanofabrication via
Xiong, SS; Wan, L; Ishida, Y; Chapuis, YA; Craig, GSW; Ruiz, R; Nealey, PF. Directed Self-Assembly of Triblock Copolymer on Chemical Patterns for Sub-10-nm Nanofabrication via. ACS Nano. 2016. Vol. 10, Pg. 7855–7865.
Roadmap on optical metamaterials
Urbas, A. M. Jacob, Z. Dal Negro, L. Engheta, N. Boardman, A. D. Egan, P. Khanikaev, A. B. Menon, V. Ferrera, M. Kinsey, N. DeVault, C. Kim, J. Shalaev, V. Boltasseva, A. Valentine, J. Pfeiffer, C. Grbic, A. Narimanov, E. Zhu, L. X. Fan, S. H. Alu, A. Poutrina, E. Litchinitser, N. M. Noginov, M. A. MacDonald, K. F. Plum, E. Liu, X. Y. Nealey, P. F. Kagan, C. R. Murray, C. B. Pawlak, D. A. Smolyaninov, I. I. Smolyaninova, V. N. Chanda, D.. Roadmap on optical metamaterials. Journal of Optics. Vol. 18, Pg. 093005.
Post-directed-self-assembly membrane fabrication for in situ analysis of block copolymer structures
J Ren, L E Ocola, R Divan, D A Czaplewski, T Segal-Peretz, S Xiong, R J Kline, C G Arges and P F Nealey. Post-directed-self-assembly membrane fabrication for in situ analysis of block copolymer structures. Nanotechnology. 2016. Vol. 27, Pg. 435303.