IISER Pune Digital Repository

A repository of scholarly research output from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Pune.

Browse publications, theses, and other research output produced by the IISER Pune community.

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PUBLICATIONS & PATENTS 7274
THESES & PROJECT REPORTS 3007
Theses submitted to IISER Pune in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the BS-MS dual degree, MSc. and Ph.D programmes. Also, project reports submitted by the students.

Recent Submissions

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Protein Breathing Induces Non-Markovian Buried Ring-Flip Dynamics in Cytochrome C
(American Chemical Society, 2026-09) ROY, BIKIRNA; MUKHERJEE, ARNAB; Dept. of Chemistry
Aromatic amino acids buried inside folded proteins play a critical role in stabilizing both the folded conformation and anchoring incoming substrate molecules. Moreover, their ring flips serve as sensitive probes of protein breathing motions. In this work, we accurately estimate the ring-flip rates of a phenylalanine residue in cytochrome C from MD simulations using enhanced sampling methods and advanced rate theories, such as the reactive flux formalism and Grote–Hynes theory (GHT). We demonstrate that the combined steric hindrance from the residues adjacent to the ring, along with their delayed response in accommodating free rotation, manifests as memory-dependent friction. Increasing solvent viscosity slows the fluctuations of these cavity residues, reinforcing the delayed response and producing a fractional viscosity dependence of the flip rate despite the ring being completely buried.
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Positivity in massive spin-3/2 EFTs and the Planck-suppressed neighbourhood of supergravity
(Springer Nature, 2026-09) DESAI, JAY; GHOSH, DIPTIMOY; Pant, Saurabh; Dept. of Physics
It is well known that a strictly massless spin-3/2 particle can interact consistently only within supergravity. Recently, positivity arguments have shown that an effective field theory of a massive Majorana spin-3/2 particle admits an arbitrarily small mass only if a graviton is present and the four-fermion contact interactions are tuned to the values dictated by = 1 supergravity. In this work, we investigate how this limit is approached at finite mass. Assuming that the graviton t-channel pole can be discarded, we derive non-forward, tree-level dispersive bounds on massive spin-3/2 contact operators and determine the region of effective couplings consistent with unitarity and analyticity. For sufficiently small m, we find that the allowed parameter space forms a bounded, Planck-suppressed neighbourhood of the supergravity point, defined by the supergravity values of the four-fermion couplings. The supergravity point lies on the boundary of this region. In the regime m ≪ MPl, the volume of the allowed region scales parametrically as and shrinks to zero as m → 0, smoothly reproducing the massless-limit results. The allowed region becomes unbounded when mass approaches the Planck scale. We further analyze the effect of including additional light scalar and pseudo-scalar degrees of freedom, motivated by the Polonyi model, and find that their couplings are also bounded in a way similar to the contact couplings and that it doesn’t enlarge the allowed contact coupling space.
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Search for a new heavy resonance decaying to a top quark and a neutral scalar boson in proton-proton collisions at √𝑠 =13 TeV
(Elsevier B.V., 2026-09) CMS Collaboration; Hayrapetyan, A.; DUBE, SOURABH; HAZARIKA, P.; KANSAL, B.; LAHA, A.; SHARMA, R.; SHARMA, SEEMA; VAISH, K.Y. et al.; Dept. of Physics
A first search at the LHC for a new heavy resonance decaying to a top quark and a neutral scalar boson ϕ in the fully hadronic final state is presented, where the ϕ boson is identified by its decay into a bottom quark-antiquark pair. The search is focused on final states in which the decay products of the highly Lorentz boosted top quark and ϕ boson are each reconstructed as a single, large-radius jet with distinct substructure. The analysis is performed using proton-proton collision data at a center-of-mass energy of 13TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138fb−1, recorded with the CMS detector at the LHC in 2016–2018. The single production of a vector-like top quark, T′, is used as a benchmark model for the signal process. The results of this search are combined with those of a previous CMS search in which semileptonic decays of the top quark were used. No significant excess of data is observed with respect to the background prediction. For the case where the neutral scalar is a standard model Higgs boson and the T′ quark width is 5% of its mass, T′ quark masses between 0.85 and 1.3TeV are excluded at 95% confidence level and the most stringent limits to date are set for masses above 2TeV. For other ϕ boson masses, upper limits as low as 0.1fb are set on the product of the T′ quark production cross section and branching fraction for its decay to a top quark and a ϕ boson.
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Role of superficial grey layer of superior colliculus in reversal learning: importance of nitric oxide synthase
(Elsevier B.V., 2026-11) Waghade, Akash M.; Kokare, Dadasaheb M.; Sahare, Dipak K.; Patil, Ashwini A.; Sabale, Vaibhav A.; Giri, Amol P.; Awathale, Sanjay N.; SUBHEDAR, NISHIKANT K.; Dept. of Biology
Reversal learning is the ability to adapt behavior to changing circumstances. It is essential for goal-directed actions and survival, and the superior colliculus (SC) is known to be involved in visual cue-guided reversal learning. The superficial grey layer (SuG) of the SC contributes to the refinement of the retinocollicular pathway and visual processing. Although this layer of the SC is rich in neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS), the role of the enzyme or nitric oxide (NO) in mediating reversal behavior driven by visual cues remains unclear. We aimed to investigate the participation of nitrergic signaling in the SuG in reversal learning. The rats were subjected to training to self-administer food pellets in reversal learning paradigm. The trained rats showed increased expression of nNOS in the SuG and tyrosine hydroxylase, a marker for dopamine, in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), compared with those trained without the reversal task. While intra-SuG 7-nitroindazole (nNOS inhibitor) showed increased active/inactive lever pressings, L-arginine (NO precursor) was not effective. MK801 caused reversal learning deficits, and we found reduced active lever press activity, while increasing inactive lever presses and locomotor behavior, indicating impaired reversal learning in rats. Intra-SuG L-arginine alleviated impaired reversal performance by increasing active lever press activity and reducing GFAP and caspase-3 expression in the SuG. Fluoro-ruby retrograde tracing was performed in the VTA, which revealed a possible nitrergic projection from SuG to VTA. We suggest that nNOS signaling in the SuG might play an important role in visual cue-associated reversal learning in rats.
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Charge separation enhanced tunable D–A integrated ionic porous organic polymers for the efficient photosynthesis of H2O2 from air and (Sea)water
(Royal Society of Chemistry, 2026-09) GOURAB K. DAM; LET, SUMANTA; JAISWAL, VARTIKA; RASAILY, SAGARMANI; MAITY, SUDIP; BISWAS, KISHALAY; GHOSH, SUJIT K. et al.; Dept. of Chemistry
Solar-driven green photocatalytic H2O2 production is a potent breakthrough technology, especially with advanced porous materials. However, the design of porous-material-based superior photocatalysts with high inherent charge separation and ORR selectivity is very challenging. In this direction, we present a rationally designed series of halide-anion-tunable cationic protonated imidazoline-core-bearing porous polymers (IPM-402Xs, X= -F, -Cl, or -Br), featuring spatially isolated redox centers with ionicity-enhanced intra-system donor–acceptor electronic properties. These polymers enable highly efficient photosynthesis of H2O2, with a production rate of 1922 µmol h−1 g−1, an unprecedented apparent quantum yield (%AQY) of 18.94, and a solar-to-chemical energy conversion (%SCC) of 1.02 for IPM-402F in O2-saturated H2O. IPM-402Xs showed excellent H2O2 photoproduction from seawater in sunlight and air, achieving 293 µmol h−1 g−1 with IPM-402F. Excited-state relaxation by anion alteration was investigated by TA analysis, backed by theoretical calculations, to understand the photocatalytic efficiency and underlying reaction mechanism of the direct 2e− ORR. This study reveals the broad potential of unexplored multifunctional tunable ionic frameworks for sustainable, green, and highly efficient H2O2 photoproduction.