Ananth Dodabalapur

Ananth Dodabalapur is an Indian-American engineer, currently the Motorola Regents Chair Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering, and previously the Ashley H. Priddy Centennial Professor, at University of Texas at Austin and a published author. He was formerly with Bell Labs, Murray Hill, NJ for more than 10 years.

Research

His research has been in the areas of organic and inorganic semiconductor devices. His recent research is on nanoscale devices for 3D integrated circuits and new device architectures for displays, neuromorphic computing, printed electronics, and light emission. He has made pioneering contributions to the fields of Organic LEDs, transistors, and Photonic Crystal Lasers. He has also worked on chemical sensors and Nano-Optics. He was the founding Editor-in-Chief of Flexible and Printed Electronics. His research work has been cited more than 30,000 times. His H-index is approximately 95. He holds 27 US patents and these have been cited more than 2000 times. He has co-founded two companies - OrganiciD and Sensorbit Systems. OrganicID was acquired by Weyerhaeuser in 2006.

Awards and recognition

He is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and was a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE. He was listed in Who's Who in America and Who's who in Science and Engineering. He is a recipient of the 2002 National Award for Team Innovation from the American Chemical Society. His work on Organic Transistors has been listed in a compilation of key achievements in Electronics for the 20th century National Academy of Engineering#Greatest Engineering Achievements of the 20th Century in the category of Electronics. He has also made pioneering contributions to the fields of Organic LEDs and Photonic Crystal Lasers. In March 2007, he was conferred honorary citizenship of the City of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He has received an "Old Cottonian of Eminence" Award from his alma mater, Bishop Cotton Boys' School, Bangalore in 2022.

Personal and Family

Dodabalapur was born in Bangalore, India in 1963. He attended Bishop Cotton Boys' School in Bangalore, Indian Institute of Technology Madras (where he received his bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering), and University of Texas at Austin, where he obtained his Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering in 1990.

His paternal grandfather, Dr. D. Hari Rao, was a doctor who was a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburg. His father, D Krishna Rao, was an engineer who was an executive in HMT Bangalore for most of his professional career. His Mother, Vatsala Rao, has been teaching music to women for more than four decades and founded an organization called Stuthivahini.org which teaches religious music. His maternal grandfather, Baily Vittal Murthy, was an England-educated Civil Engineer who worked for the City of Bangalore and was Chief Engineer. His maternal grandmother, Kamala Bai, is descended from two prominent Madhwa Brahmin families. Kamala Bai's mother was the daughter of Sir P. N. Krishnamurti, Fifth Jagirdar of Yelandur and Dewan of Mysore between 1901 and 1906, who was a direct descendent of Dewan Purniah, the First Dewan of Mysore. Kamala Bai's father was Colathur Raja Rao Sahib, whose father was Dewan Bahadur Colathur Ramachandra Rao Sahib, an eminent legal scholar, who was also President of the Nationalist Mahajana Sabha, which was formed to help India win independence. The Colathur Rao Sahibs are descended from Vedaji Bhaskar Rao Pant, a cavalry commander who was closely associated with Maratha Chief Shahji, and became the first Jagirdhar of Arni in 1638.

Ananth Dodabalapur is married to Rati Chitnis Dodabalapur and has two children, Sonia and Siddharth.