Title: EMPLOYING COMMON IONS AND MOLECULES FOR SUSTAINABLE CLEAN WATER

Speaker: Dr. Swathy J. R.

Abstract: Despite the existence of several innovative solutions in the field of water purification, successful technologies continue to encounter significant challenges. Many of these technologies lack sustainability and durability due to frequent manual interventions and associated expenses. While various global entities, both governmental and non-governmental, are striving to provide clean water to those in need and are evaluating the water demand in the context of climate change, industries are struggling to find alternative options that are stable, cost-effective, uninterrupted, and reliable to address this critical issue. For these technologies to achieve sustainability and widespread adoption, they must not only be energy-efficient, rapid, and affordable, but also environmentally benign.

The objective of the presentation is to emphasize the synergistic effects of ions on biological systems and discuss the design of materials that can sustainably release both anions and cations. The talk will present the use of carbonates as one of the dimension to counteract cytotoxicity induced by arsenic. Additionally, insights into the application of ambient mass spectrometry as a tool for detecting biofouling on water purification materials will be shared during this session.

Biography: Dr. Swathy is a proactive researcher with an industrial exposure and holds her interdisciplinary doctoral degree from IIT MADRAS under the guidance of Padmashri. Prof. T. Pradeep (Chemistry), Prof. Ligy Philip (Civil Engr.) on the topic, “Employing Common Ions and Molecules for Sustainable Clean Water”. Further, she is now heading the Validation wing at R&D, Eureka Forbes Limited, monitoring technology development, institutional collaborations, bench-marking and field trial data processing. She drives open innovation and is a part of cross functional ratification team to develop robust strategies to support product applications.

She has a demonstrated history of technology transfer and application oriented research related to drinking water purification. Swathy’s research interests are in water chemistry & microbiology interface focusing on commercially viable and environmentally benign advanced materials, their Ionic interaction in water, and its analytical perspectives. Her work experience includes design, development, optimization, scale-up and ratification of commercial water purification technologies to address water pollution around the world. Analytical expertise to understand the performance of technologies and designing digital water monitoring systems are some of her highlighted deliveries.

She has 16+ Indian, US and WIPO patents and 10 high impact research publications in peer reviewed journals (Total impact factor of 81.6), in the area of sustainable solutions for drinking water purification. Her recent work on reducing the water wastage from Reverse osmosis technology has been incorporated into the Aquaguard® products under the names Aquaguard® Crystal NXT HR RO+UV+MTDS and Aquaguard® Aura HR RO+UV+MTDS, and are successful in the Indian market with diverse water conditions for the past 2 years.

She has also been elected as a talent to represent SDG – 6 (water), by the UNLEASH global community. She is a part of sustainability development team at Eureka Forbes Limited, for handling the corporate’s sustainability projects. She is presently serving as a subject matter expert in industry’s pollution control committee.

Her patented work titled ‘Anion effect on disinfection of silver’ was sold to a “US based Nanoholding Inc., a Delaware corporation” for its commercialization. Her work titled “Rollpure”, a rolling water purifier won the prestigious Gandhian Young Technological Innovation (GYTI) Award from the honorable President of India.