Vikram Jayaram received his Bachelor’s in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University in 1978 and his PhD from Stanford University in 1985. Following postdoctoral fellowships at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and University of California – Santa Barbara, he joined Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore in 1990. Professor’s Jayaram’s interests lie in the mechanical behaviour of thin films, the processing of ceramics and ceramic composites, non-equilibrium synthesis of oxides and electron microscopy. He teaches courses on fracture, introduction to materials science and electron microscopy.
Research: Professor Jayaram’s research into infiltration methods to make ceramic – metal composites established the role of solute elements in promoting infiltration as also the role of variable pore diameter in retarding capillary flow by orders of magnitude. His group demonstrated that chemical routes could be used to synthesize unusual metastable amorphous compositions in alumina based oxides that displayed anomalously low densities and elastic moduli and whose structure could be modified by plastic flow. In the field of ultra high temperature ceramics based on transition metal carbides and borides, his group was able to utilise transient plasticity to produce dense materials by reactive hot pressing at temperatures hundreds of degrees below those reported earlier. He has developed new insight into the mechanical behaviour of coatings using novel small scale testing methods combined with high resolution microscopy.
Professional Accomplishments: Professor Jayaram serves as an associate editor in Journal of the American Ceramic Society, Bulletin of Materials Science, Materials Science & Engineering B, Transactions of the Indian Institute of Metals and Transactions of the Indian Ceramic Society. He has served on the advisory committee of the materials panel in Department of Science & Technology and Aeronautical Research & Development Board and on the research councils of AMPRI-CSIR (Bhopal) and CGCRI-CSIR (Calcutta) as well as the advisory panel for Materials Science Division of NAL-CSIR. He is a co-convener of the Advanced Facility for Microscopy and Microanalysis at IISc. He was elected to the fellowship of The American Ceramic Society and Indian Institute of Metals.
Awards: Rustom Chokshi Award for Excellence in Research in Engineering (2006)
National Metallurgists Day Award, Ministry of Steel & Mines (2000)
Materials Research Society of India Medal Lecture ( 1997 )
