Kizkeyil Lukose Sebastian earned his BSc (Special) from Kerala University, MSc from Calicut University and did his PhD (1976) from Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore under the supervision of AK Chandra. He was Lecturer at St Thomas College, Palai (1975) and moved to the Department of Chemistry, Calicut University (1976) where he became Reader (1984). He then moved to Cochin University as Professor in the same year, and then joined as Professor at IISc (1996). He was a researcher at the universities of Liverpool and Gothenberg. He was Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at Munich and Berlin. He also worked at National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Japan.

Academic and Research Achievements: Sebastian was originally trained as a quantum chemist. His subsequent studies related theoretical electrochemistry under the influence of SK Rangarajan. He made notable contributions to the theory of electron transfer reactions at electrodes. He was one of the first to develop time-dependent coupled cluster theory and apply it to scattering problems. At IISc, a major part of his work was concerned with the theoretical description of biophysical processes. The most important of these is his analysis of the theory of barrier crossing by long chain molecules. He has contributed to a variety of topics like chemisorption theory, path integrals, electron solvation, quantum dynamics, first passage times, polymer dynamics, FRET, etc.

Other Contributions: Sebastian worked in Kerala for a long period of time and contributed significantly to the teaching of quantum chemistry. He served on the Editorial boards of Pramana, Resonance and Journal of Theoretical and Computational Nanoscience. He has served on the Science Education Panel of the Indian Academy of Sciences.

Awards and Honours: Professor Sebastian was awarded the SS Bhatnagar prize (1995), Linus Pauling Lecture Award of MG University, Kottayam (1996), Swadeshi Sastra Puraskar (1996), MN Saha Memorial Lecture Award (2005) and RP Mitra Memorial Lecture Award (2007). He was elected Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore in 1994. He has been an Amrut Mody Chair Professor at the IISc, and is a JC Bose Fellow.