About the Department
Objective
The Department of Organic chemistry was started in the year 1950 by the University of Madras as one of the science departments to focus on research in the area of organic chemistry. M.Sc. Course by thesis was conducted during the same time later replaced (from 1977) as a two year M.Sc. Course with specialization in Organic Chemistry. M.Phil degree was introduced in 1973, which was offered jointly with the departments of Physical Chemistry and Inorganic Chemistry. Since then the department is focusing its efforts in teaching and research activities at M.Sc., M.Phil and Ph.D levels. Dr. K. N. Menon was the first Head of the Department and later Dr. S. Swaminathan joined as Reader in 1953. The research of Dr.Menon and his students during 1950 to 1960 was centered essentially in 1. Synthesis of natural products; 2. Investigations of Properties of fats and terpenes.
After the retirement of Prof. K. N. Menon in 1960, Dr. Swaminathan became the Professor and Head of the Department of Organic Chemistry. During this period Dr. B. S. Thiagarajan, Dr. P. Shanmugam, Dr. R. Balasubramanian, Dr. P. S. Subramanian, Dr. V. T. Ramakrishnan, Dr. K. Rajagopalan, Dr. K. Narasimhan and Dr. P. C. Srinivasan have been serving as faculties in the Department. After the retirement of Prof. S. Swaminathan in 1983, Dr. K. Rajagopalan succeeded him as Head of the Department followed by Dr. V. T. Ramakrishnan in1998. He was succeeded by Dr. P. C. Srinivasan in 2001 and Dr. R. Raghunathan in 2004 and now Dr. P. Rajakumar has taken over as Head from 2007. Presently, we have a faculty strength of five, with Prof. P. Rajakumar, as Head and Prof. R. Raghunathan, as UGC Emirters Professor and Dr. A. K. Mohanakrishnan, Dr. M. Bakhthadoss and Dr. T. Mohan Das as Assistant Professors.
The thrust area of the Department is Synthetic Organic Chemistry. As an outcome of this recognition of the outstanding work done by Prof. Swaminathan and other faculties, the Department of Organic Chemistry has been given the Special Assistance Programme status by the University Grants Commission , New Delhi in the year 1982. The UGC-SAP support has given a big leap to this Department of Organic Chemistry in pursuing research in specialized thrust areas. The Department also supported by means of individulal faculty given to PI's by DST, CSIR and UGC. The UGC-SAP was extended to II phase in 1993 and III phase in 1998. The area of research work involves synthesis of complex heterocyclic molecules of biological importance, supramolecular chemistry, organic nano materials and their applications, carbohydrate chemistry and asymmetric synthesis. The department is funded by DST to a tune of 80K under FIST programme and has earned by all individual faculty members as projects, worth 2.5 crores from various funding agencies like DST,CSIR and UGC by way of research projects during the last three years . Recently, DST has given one four grant of 2.35 crores under FIST phase II for the purchase of HRMS, CHNS Analyzer, HPLC, IR and other sophisticated instrument. The Department has produced 150 Ph.D students during the last 60 years of which two are Bhatnagar awardees and about 1500 papers were published in peer reviewed journals. The Department is equipped with most of the sophisticated analytical instruments such as NMR (300 MHz), FT-IR, HPLC, CV, Fluorescence, DSC, Polarimeter, UV-visible and mass spectrometer. Presently we have 28 students in M.Sc (Ist & IInd year), 7 students in M.Phil and 50 students in Ph.D programme. The Department is poised to grow further with more innovative and creative research which has wide applicability. In future it is proposed to synthesis organic materials which will have application in electronic industry, such as molecular switches, light emitting diodes and also organic compunds used for pharacentical indiduty as well as for biomedical applications.
-
To develop and supply good man power with excellent skills in synthetic Organic Chemistry that would suit various pharmaceutical and organic fine chemical companies at national and international level.
-
To impart higher quality of education especially in the field of Organic Chemistry.
-
To generate synthetic skills and eventually develop newer synthetic routes for various biologically and medicinally important organic compounds and intermediates including organic materials and heterocyclic compounds.
-
To develop newer drugs and various antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral, antihypertensive, anticonvulsant, antiarthima, anticancer and antioxidant compounds to eradicate the health related problems of human society.
-
To generate excellent interaction of various chemical industries with our departmental students through internship and other programmes.
-
To organize campus interview by arranging the various organic chemical companies like Shasun, Orchid, Biocon, Jubliant Biosys and Sanmar to employ our students with high salary usually in the range of 20K to 30K per month.
-
To derive excellent production from the energetically dynamic and hard working student communities.
-
To train the students to successfully complete the national level tests (UGC, CSIR & GATE) which is the basic eligibility to enter in to research degree in renowned national institutes & universities.
Mission
-
To impart education in the field of chemical sciences specifically more for the downtrodden people and economically backward society.
-
To provide education with financial assistance in the form of scholarships and fellowships to all students and also through earn while you learn schemes.
-
To offer easily employable educational opportunities so that each individual can find job immediately after completing their degree.
-
To practically implement the immagination and dreams of our great National leaders like Peraringar Anna, Pakutharivu Thandai Periyar, Puratechi Thalaivar MGR and Annal Dr.Ambethkar to the students community.
