NISER

Employment:

• 2021 - Present: Assistant Professor, School of Physical Sciences, NISER Bhubaneshwar, India.
• 2021 - Present: Adjunct Advisor, TeraDynamics Group, Laboratory for Multifunctional Ferroic Materials, Department of Materials Science, ETH Zürich, Switzerland.
• 2019 - 2021: Team Leader, TeraDynamics Group, Laboratory for Multifunctional Ferroic Materials, Department of Materials Science, ETH Zürich, Switzerland.
• 2017 - 2021: Postdoc, Laboratory for Multifunctional Ferroic Materials, Department of Materials Science, ETH Zürich, Switzerland.
• 2016 - 2017: Postdoc, National Enterprise for nanoScience and nanoTechnology (NEST), Italy
• 2015 - 2016: Postdoc, Applied Solid State Physics, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Bochum, Germany

Education:

• 2012 - 2015: Ph.D. (summa cum laude), Applied Solid State Physics, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Bochum, Germany and Max Planck Institute for Iron Research, Düsseldorf, Germany
• 2009 - 2011: M.Sc. Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, India.
• 2006 - 2009: B.Sc. (H) Physics, Ramakrishna Mission Vidyamandira, under University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India.

Ultrafast dynamics, Nonlinear 2D terahertz spectroscopy, Time-resolved terahertz spectroscopy, Strongly correlated electronic systems, Correlation physics

• SERB Startup Research Grant
• Received the Institute of Physics (IOP) trusted reviewer status
• ETH Zürich Career Seed Grant
• International Max Planck Research School (IMPRS) Fellowship
• GATE 2011

Refer to the Google Scholar page or the Research Gate page.

Selected Publications:

15. P. Shee, C.-J. Yang, S. K. Pandey, A. K. Nandy, R. Kulkarni, A. Thamizhavel, M. Fiebig, and S. Pal, Terahertz crystal electric field transitions in a Kondo-lattice antiferromagnet, Physical Review B 109, 075133 (2024).

14. A. Puthukkudi, S. Nath, P. Shee, A. Dutta, C. V. Rajput, S. Bommakanti, J. Mohapatra, M. Samal, S. Anwar, S. Pal, and B. P. Biswal, Terahertz conductivity of free-standing 3D covalent organic framework membranes fabricated via triple-layer-dual interfacial approach, Advanced Materials, 202312960 (2023). 

13. C.-J. Yang, K. Kliemt, C. Krellner, J. Kroha, M. Fiebig, and S. Pal, Critical slowing down near a magnetic quantum phase transition with fermionic breakdown, Nature Physics 19, 1605 (2023). 

12. C.-J. Yang, J. Li, M. Fiebig, and S. Pal, Terahertz control of many-body dynamics in quantum materials, Nature Reviews Materials 8, 518 (2023).

11. J. Li, C.-J. Yang, R. Mondal, C. Tzschaschel, and S. Pal, A perspective on nonlinearities in coherent magnetization dynamics, Applied Physics Letters 120, 050501 (2022).

10. C.-J. Yang, J. Li, J. Lehmann, N. Strkalj, M. Trassin, M. Fiebig, and S. Pal, Birefringence of orthorhombic DyScO3: Towards a terahertz quarter-wave plate, Applied Physics Letters 118, 223506 (2021).

9. S. Pal, N. Strkalj, C.-J. Yang, M. C. Weber, M. Trassin, M. Woerner, and M. Fiebig, Origin of terahertz soft-mode nonlinearities in ferroelectric perovskites, Physical Review X 11, 021023 (2021).

8. S. Markmann, M. Franckié, S. Pal, D. Stark, M. Beck, M. Fiebig, G. Scalari, and J. Faist, Two-dimensional spectroscopy on a THz quantum cascade structure, Nanophotonics 10, 171 (2021).

7. C.-J. Yang, S. Pal, F. Zamani, K. Kliemt, C. Krellner, O. Stockert, H. v. Löhneysen, J. Kroha, and M. Fiebig, Terahertz conductivity of heavy-fermion systems from time-resolved spectroscopy, Physical Review Research 2, 033296 (2020).

6. N. Strkalj, G. De Luca, M. Campanini, S. Pal, J. Schaab, C. Gattinoni, N. Spaldin, M. D. Rossell, M. Fiebig, and M. Trassin, Depolarizing field effects in epitaxial capacitor heterostructures, Physical Review Letters 123, 147601 (2019).

5. S. Pal, C. Wetli, F. Zamani, O. Stockert, H. v. Löhneysen, M. Fiebig, and J. Kroha, Fermi volume evolution and crystal-field excitations in heavy-fermion compounds probed by time-domain terahertz spectroscopy, Physical Review Letters 122, 096401 (2019).

4. C. Wetli, S. Pal, J. Kroha, K. Kliemt, C. Krellner, O. Stockert, H. v. Löhneysen, and M. Fiebig, Time-resolved collapse and revival of the Kondo state near a quantum phase transition, Nature Physics 14, 1103 (2018).

3. L. Consolino, S. Jung, A. Campa, M. De Regis, S. Pal, J.-H. Kim, K. Fujita, A. Ito, M. Hitaka, S. Bartalini, P. De Natale, M. A. Belkin, and M. S. Vitiello, Spectral purity and tunability of terahertz quantum cascade laser sources based on intracavity difference-frequency generation, Science Advances 3, e1603317 (2017).

2. S. Markmann, H. Nong, S. Pal, T. Fobbe, N. Hekmat, R. A. Mohandas, P. Dean, L. Li, E. H. Linfield, A. G. Davies, A. D. Wieck, and N. Jukam, Two-dimensional coherent spectroscopy of a THz quantum cascade laser: observation of multiple harmonics, Optics Express 25, 21753 (2017).

1. S. Pal, H. Nong, S. Markmann, N. Kukharchyk, S. R. Valentin, S. Scholz, A. Ludwig, C. Bock, U. Kunze, A. D. Wieck, and N. Jukam, Ultrawide electrical tuning of light-matter interaction in a high electron mobility transistor structure, Scientific Reports 5, 16812 (2015).

The conventional weakly correlated systems are often described by the interaction of a single electron with its environment, for example, semiconductors. In contrast, the properties of the so-called strongly correlated states are determined by the collective interaction of many electrons via their charges and spins. The complexity that arises from such interactions between many particles gives rise to many fascinating phenomena. This covers the long-range magnetic order to recent discoveries like superconductivity, colossal magnetoresistance, and topological magnetic or electric states. Owing to their multi-particle nature, the microscopic understanding of the ground state with such dominant strong-correlation phenomena is a demanding task. For a thorough understanding, it is thus indispensable, however, to go away from the ground state and study the dynamical behavior of such systems. 

On one hand, the functionality of a device always results from bringing it away from its ground state. Nevertheless, studying the non-equilibrium behavior of the ground state reveals the microscopic processes at work, stabilizing a strongly correlated state. Over the last years, various experimental and theoretical tools have been rapidly improving, and the field of strong-correlation dynamics is now in the process of establishing itself as a new and powerful branch in condensed-matter research. Because of the emerging nature of the field, research activities are still ambiguously diverse. Important advances are made in certain directions but at the same time, other aspects of crucial significance are disregarded -- an overarching coherence of the field yet needs to be established.

The broad scope and extent of our research direction in NISER is to substantially promote this overarching coherence and contribute to building a solid foundation in the field of strong correlation dynamics. The primary research topics involve, in a broad manner: (a) Coherent low-energy excitation of correlated states and (b) Studying phase-resolved dynamics of elementary excitations.

Dr. Koushik Mondal (Postdoc)

Mr. Amit Haldar (Ph.D. Student)

Ms. Payel Shee (Ph.D. Student)

Ms. Arpita Dutta (Ph.D. Student)

Mr. Jyotiprakash Satapathy (Masters' Project)

Ms. Aditi Pradhan (Masters' Project)

Mr. Kshitij Goyal (Prospective Masters' Project)

Mr. Swosti Prakash Sarangi (Prospective Masters' Project)

Mr. Nainish Tickoo  (Prospective Masters' Project)

External Ph.D. supervision:

Ms. Jingwen Li (Ph.D. Student at ETH Zurich, Switzerland)

Alumni:

Dr. Ranjana Rani Das (Postdoc)

Mr. Adarsha Mohit Sahu (Masters' Project)

Mr. Ashish Panigrahi (Masters' Project)

Mr. Debankit Priyadarshi (Masters' Project)

Ms. Chia-Jung Yang (Ph.D. Student at ETH Zurich, Switzerland)

P456/P656: Nonlinear Optics and Lasers (January - May, 2024)

P443/P444: Integrated Physics Lab I+II (January - May, 2023)

P207: Linear Optics (August - November, 2022)

P345: Optics Lab (August - November, 2022)

P456/P656: Nonlinear Optics and Lasers (January - May, 2022)

P462/P657: Introduction to Quantum Optics (August - November, 2021)

SPS Seminar/Colloquium coordinator

SPS UGCS Committee member