“Selenium nanoparticles: a review on synthesis and biomedical applications”
Materials Advances publishes review articles on topics across materials science, which are open access and free to read. To celebrate our excellent review articles, we asked the authors of some of our most well-received review articles to discuss their work in more detail.
In this post, we share insights from our interview with the authors of the recently published Materials Advances review “Selenium nanoparticles: a review on synthesis and biomedical applications“.
Insights from the authors of a highly cited Materials Advances review article
What aspect of your research are you most excited about at the moment?
“Elemental selenium (Se) has great importance in the fields of physics, chemistry, and biology. Se is an important element for human requirement. The United Kingdom group of vitamins and minerals recommended the daily intake of selenium by women and men should be 60 μg and 70 μg, respectively. A daily intake of more than 400 μg could be toxic which leads to a disorder known as selenosis. Selenium plays a key role as a biochemical component of glutathione peroxidase, an enzyme responsible for the protection of essential SH-groups and for the decomposition of peroxides, thereby acting as an antioxidant. In addition to immense role in biology, selenium based nanomaterials have attracted great attention of researchers and in fact metal selenides quantum dots are key component of modern day nanotechnology. Source of selenium often is a tricky component in such materials but bio-generated selenium may become a potential step in fine tuning and biocompatible quantum dots for a range on biomedical applications.
What do you find most challenging about your research?
Availability of greener selenium source for advancement of metal selenide quantum dots and their utility in the filed of biological sciences and biomedical industries as fluorescent tags, photonic materials. Such a collection for articles and review on single element chemistry such as the current one leads to much ease of operation for the researchers and the challenge associated can be managed and handled more effectively. In my research source of selenium is still a great challenge.
What does it mean to you to have a highly cited review article?
Getting recognition for our research and scientific contribution and that too from our peers from the Royal Society is much of moment of proud for us and is very gratifying feeling. It boost the confidence and makes us more responsible for conducting impactful research in our chosen field.
How do you feel about Materials Advances as a place to publish research on this topic?
When Royal Society floated this journal almost 3-4 years ago, we were sure that like any other RSC publication, this too will fetch global standard and we were proven right when its impact factor was disclosed last year and I am very proud to be associated with such new yet highly prestigious journal. Not many get the opportunity to be part of RSC publications. I am proud of my team to have agreed with me to choose materials advances for our publications. Ever since its inception, this journal has maintained high-quality research publications and has become first choice for material science.
What is one piece of career-related advice or wisdom that you would like to share with early career scientists?
Early career researchers should avoid being part of mad-race that publishes randomly without much clarity in their goals. They should identify research problems that will impact human race globally and try to come out of pathbreaking research results. They should not hesitate to establish early collaboration for multidisciplinary research as in today’s time applied research is much in demand and making great impact
Meet the authors
 Dr Pawan Khanna received his PhD in Organometallic Chemistry of Se & Te from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay in 1989– 90. He went to Queens’ University of Belfast and University of Wales at Swansea (UK) for his postdoctoral research in the group of Prof. Christopher P Morley during 1989–92. Later, he joined C-MET, Pune. He was awarded the BOYSCAST fellowship of DST, Govt of India during 1998–99 to work on quantum dots driven by organometallic chemistry at University of St. Andrews, Scotland (UK) with Professor David J Cole-Hamilton. He joined Defence Institute of Advanced Technology, Pune, India (DIAT) in 2011 as its first Professor and is currently a HAG Professor and Head of the Dept. of Applied Chemistry. He has also served as dean of academic affairs at DIAT. His research interests include organometallic chemistry, materials chemistry, nano-chemistry of biological importance, quantum dots, nano-inks, nano-fluids and photo catalysis. He has published over 220 research papers. He has recently been named as the top 1% materials’ scientist in the world by a study conducted by Stanford University, USA. He has guided more than 70 masters, doctoral and post-doctoral researchers and completed 20 grant-in-aid research projects. |
 Neha Bisht obtained her BTech Degree in Chemical Engineering from BT Kumaon Institute of Technology (BTKIT), Dwarahat, Uttarakhand India in 2014. Continuing her studies, she received MTech Degree in Materials Science and Chemical Technology from the Defence Institute of Advanced Technology, Pune, India in the Department of Applied Chemistry in 2019, where she was a Gold medalist. During her study for her Master’s Degree, she received the All India Council Technical Education (AICTE) Fellowship through Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE). She worked as a Project Assistant under the guidance of Prof. P. K. Khanna at DIAT, Pune, India. She is a life member of the ‘‘Society for Materials and Chemistry (SMC)’’, BARC, Mumbai. She is a lifetime member of ‘‘DIAT Alumni Association’’. She is currently persuing her PhD in south Korea. Her research interests include nanomaterials, hybrid nanocomposites, thermoelectric materials, metal oxides, ternary metal chalcogenides and their energy applications. |
 Priyanka obtained her BSc degree from Maharshi Dayanand University, Rohtak, Haryana, in the year 2015. During the BSc, she received a ‘‘Promotion of Science and Education (POSE)’’ scholarship from Department of Science & Technology (DST), Govt. of Haryana, India. Continuing her studies, she received an MSc degree in Applied Chemistry from Malaviya National Institute of Advanced Technology, Jaipur, India, in 2017. She completed her PhD under the guidance of Prof. P. K. Khanna at Defence Institute of Advanced Technology, Pune, India in November 2023. She is a life member of ‘‘Society for Materials and Chemistry (SMC)’’, BARC, Mumbai. She has published over 12 research articles and has a patent to her credit. Her research interests include nanomaterials, quantum dots, materials chemistry and their energy applications |
We congratulate the authors on their impactful work and wish them success in their future academic research!
