At the time of this GIAR award (May, 2011), Priyanka Bhattacharya was a doctoral candidate in Physics at Clemson University. Priyanka was later selected to receive the 2012 Linus Pauling Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship presented by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). The fellowship is designed for "the next generation of scientists and engineers who will push the boundaries of science to world-recognized discoveries.
Priyanka received her GIAR for a project to advanced understanding of the fundamental interactions of dendritic polymers with common environmental pollutants for their applications towards a sustainable environmental remediation. Dendrimers are a class of soft polymeric nanomaterials that possess high degree branching and order, low viscosity, monodispersity, ample interior voids, and pH-responsive surface charge and radius of gyration.