DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY

Pulak Dutta's research is focused on nanoscale order in soft materials, particularly at surfaces and interfaces. A material is considered 'soft' if its structure and thus its properties are easily changed; interfaces cause molecules to arrange in new ways and thus help build potentially useful new materials. Dutta's research group seeks to understand what structures are formed under what conditions, and why. In particular, they do in-situ X-ray scattering studies on physisorbed (so-called Langmuir) and chemisorbed (so-called self-assembled) molecular monolayers and multilayers, and on interfacial liquids. Much of this research is done using synchrotron radiation at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory, and at the National Synchrotron Light Source at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Awards and Honors

• Fellow, American Physical Society
• Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science

Selected Publications

• “Electrostatic origin of element selectivity during rare earth adsorption”, Mitchell Miller, Honghao Li, Miaoqi Chu, Sangjun Yoo, Wei Bu, Monica Olvera de la Cruz and Pulak Dutta, Phys. Rev. Lett. 122, 058001 (2019)
• “Ultraslow Dynamics at a Charged Silicon-Ionic Liquid Interface Revealed by X-ray Reflectivity”, Miaoqi Chu, Mitchell Miller, Travis Douglas and Pulak Dutta, J. Phys. Chem. C 121, 3841 (2017)
• “Atomic Number Dependent "Structural Transitions" in Ordered Lanthanide Monolayers: Role of the Hydration Shell”, Mitchell Miller, Miaoqi Chu, Binhua Lin, Wei Bu and Pulak Dutta, Langmuir 33, 1412 (2017)
• Crowding and anomalous capacitance at an electrode-ionic liquid interface observed using operando X-ray scattering”, Miaoqi Chu, Mitchell Miller and Pulak Dutta, ACS Central Science 2, 175 (2016)
• Observation of Ordered Structures in Counterion Layers Near Wet Charged Surfaces---a Potential Mechanism for Charge Inversion”, Mitchell Miller, Miaoqi Chu, Binhua Lin, Mati Meron and Pulak Dutta,  Langmuir 32, 73 (2016)
• “What X-ray reflectivity can tell us about the interface profile of water near hydrophobic surfaces”, Ahmet Uysal, Miaoqi Chu, Benjamin Stripe, Amod Timalsina, Sudeshna Chattopadhyay, Christian M. Schlepütz, Tobin J. Marks, and Pulak Dutta, Phys. Rev. B 88, 035431 (2013)
• “Charge, stereochemistry or epitaxy? Towards biomimetic nucleation at mixed monolayer templates”, B. Stripe, A. Uysal, B. Lin, M.M. Meron and P. Dutta, Langmuir 28, 572 (2012)
• “Reverse Self-Assembly: (111)-Oriented Gold Crystallization at Alkylthiol Monolayer Templates”, Ahmet Uysal, Benjamin Stripe, Binhua Lin, Mati Meron and Pulak Dutta, Phys. Rev. Lett.107, 115503 (2011)