Prize Recipient

Sohang Kundu
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

"For illuminating work using real-time path integral methods to reveal the interplay of electronic and vibrational dynamics in excitation energy transfer."

Sohang Kundu obtained a B.Sc. in Chemistry from Presidency University in 2015, and a Master’s from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, in India in 2017. He received his PhD in 2023 from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where he developed real-time path integral methods for studying coupled electron-vibration dynamics, under the guidance of Prof. Nancy Makri. Using these methods, Sohang and his collaborators performed the first all-state all-mode quantum simulation of energy transfer in the bacterial light harvesting-complex-II at room temperature. This simulation showed that electron-vibration couplings enable the high efficiency of energy transfer in bacterial light-harvesting, and highlighted the crucial role played by nuclear quantum effects. Sohang’s work has illustrated how vibronic coherences accelerate exciton relaxation in porphyrin complexes, and create complex dynamical signatures during exciton-transport through J-aggregates of perylene bisimides. He is also a developer of the publicly available software PATHSUM. Sohang is currently a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Timothy C. Berkelbach’s group at Columbia University where he is working with the Columbia Center for Computational Electrochemistry to understand the structural properties and dynamics of molecule-metal interfaces. He maintains his enthusiasm for quantum dynamics research, with a keen interest in developing methods in conjunction with ab initio electronic structure theory.

Eric Bittner (Chair), Andreas Osterwalder, Ignacio Franco, John Doyle (PhD advisor of 2023 Awardee)