I am Abhijit Mishra.

I am doing my BTech in Metallurgical Engineering and

Materials Science at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay.

After completing high school, I took the joint entrance examination for the IITs. I
was ranked 1514 out of more than 150,000 students from all over India. With this ranking
I chose to do Btech in Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science at IIT Bombay.

Before joining IIT, my knowledge in the field of Materials science was very little.
In the past three years, my interest and appreciation of this branch of engineering has
greatly increased. This can be seen from my grades. My cumulative performance index
(CPI) has increased steadily from the first semester to the sixth semester. I hope to keep
this trend in the final two semesters. At the end of the third year I am ranked 2nd out of
52 in my batch with a CPI of 9.02 out of 10.00.

Of the different fields of materials science, electronic materials intersts me the

most. I chose the topics for my senior and junior projects accordingly.In addition to the
projects , I have also done a couse on " Electronic Properties of Materials".

I am doing my senior project on "The Dielectric and Pyroelectric Properties of

Strontium Barium Niobate Ceramics" under the guidance of Prof. Ajit R. Kulkarni,
Department of Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science, IIT Bombay. Strontium
Barium Niobate (SBN) is a ferroelectric material with a tungsten bronze structure. It has
wide applications in electro - optics, piezoelectric and surface acoustic devices and infra
red sensors because of its large pyroelectric coefficient and photorefractive properties. the
objective of this project is to measure the dielectric and pyroelectric properties of SBN 50
samples prepared by different methods. I have to assemble the setup for measuring the
pyroelectric properties. In addition, the microstructure of the samples will be observed
and efforts will be made to correlate the dielectric and pyroelectric propeties with the
microstructure.

I did my junior project on "Inorganic Composite Electrolytes" under the guidance

of Prof. Prakash Gopalan, Department of Metallurgical Engineering and Materials
Science, IIT Bombay. Composite Electrolytes are multiphase solid systems in which two
or more materials are mixed together to achieve an enhancement in the ionic
conductivity. Generally, fine particles of an insulator, like Alumina, is finely dispersed in
a matrix of a moderate ionic conductor, like LiI. The project included a review of the
characteristics of inorganic composite electrolytes, the theoretical models proposed to
explain the characteristics and a look at some of the composite electrilyte systems.

My goal is to get a university appointment and pursue a career in

research/academics. For this a PhD from a top institute like MIT would be extremely
helpful. The excellent research facilities and qualified faculty will help me in fulfilling
my dream. I hope that my application is favourably considered.