Ph. D. Advertisement Varsha 2026

Applications are invited from highly motivated students having qualified in CSIR-JRF, UGC-JRF (Category-I) for admission to the Ph. D. programs of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Thiruvananthapuram (IISER TVM) in the School of Physics for the session starting from October 2026, i.e., Varsha 2026, semester. Candidates are required to apply through the online portal only. The online application portal will be open from 26th September 2026 at (https://phdadmission.iisertvm.ac.in/index.php/applicant/register/27)

General Eligibility Criteria

(For School- or Centre-specific eligibility criteria, see the tables below)

1. 6.5 CGPA on a 10-point scale (or first-class equivalent) or first class in Master's program in a relevant discipline as declared by the respective university for General/OBC-NCL candidates and a minimum of 50% marks (or a CGPA of 5.5 in the 10-point scale) for SC/ST and PwD candidates. (BE/BTech degree in relevant specialization is admissible for select areas of research
2. The candidate must have qualified CSIR-JRF, UGC-JRF (Category-I)

Research Areas

Experimental Physics

• (*) Super capacitors, Solid-state Lithium Batteries https://faculty.iisertvm.ac.in/shaijumon/
• Quantum Magnetism
• Excitons in 2D materials, Quantum Emitters, Epsilon Near Zero Systems https://jmitra.wixsite.com/joygroup
• Superconductivity, quantum materials, energy materials https://sites.google.com/iisertvm.ac.in/quemat
• Physics of semciconductor devices (solar cells, light emitting diodes, transistors, memory, bioelectronic) based on quantum/Organic/perovskite/2D materials using various optical and electrical spectroscopy techniques. https://faculty.iisertvm.ac.in/manoj/
• Ultrafast Optical Spectroscopy of 2D nanomaterials https://rajeevkini.iisertvm.ac.in/
• Nonlinear optics, frequency combs, microwave photonics, Photonic quantum computing
• (*) Biomedical Instrumentation and Imaging; Development of Light Sheet Microscopy (LSM) or Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy (SPIM) imaging system; Development of photacoustic imaging (PAI) system - both microscopy and tomography (https://scholar.google.co.in/citations?user=CGKTXz0AAAAJ&hl=en; https://www.iisertvm.ac.in/faculty/suhesh.kumar)
• (*) Advanced semiconductor devices for power / energy conversion https://www.iisertvm.ac.in/faculty/guru
• (*) Quantum Materials (Topological materials, and Van der Waals heterostructures), Spintronics (Multiferroics) https://www.fmdlab.in/
• (*) Ultrafast molecular dynamics, Generation of attosecond pulse train. https://www.iisertvm.ac.in/faculty/krishnendugope
• (*) Quantum dot spin-qubits, 2D superconducting circuits https://faculty.iisertvm.ac.in/qtran/
• Sensor array Devices and Artifical intelligence, application is space, medtech. Microfabrication, Instrumentation. Thermal transport in thin film chalcogenides, microfabricated devices for energy harvesting and on-chip cooling. [https://faculty.iisertvm.ac.in/smartlab/]

Theoretical Physics

• Condensed Matter Theory: Strongly correlated electron systems, Neural quantum state (NQS) wave function for quantum many-body systems, Topological phases of matter.
• Nonlinear Dynamics and Complex Systems: Aadptive Networks https://faculty.iisertvm.ac.in/skumar/
• Condensed matter theory: Quantum Materials, Magnetism and Spintronics https://sites.google.com/view/souvikpaul-cmslab
• Beyond Standard Model of Particle Physics, Effective field theory, Baryon number violation, Dark Matter (https://www.iisertvm.ac.in/faculty/mathewthomas or https://inspirehep.net/authors/1413667)
• Quantum information theory, quantum materials (theory) and quantum limited sensing and metrology
• Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation and Analysis of Cosmological and Astrophysical Datasets https://iisertvm.irins.org/profile/94131
• High energy Astrophysics (Computational astrophysics in gamma ray bursts)
• Beyond the Standard Model of particle physics, Collider phenomenology, Matter under extreme conditions, Neutron Star https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=IwMWofEAAAAJ&hl=en
• Theoretical and computational physics of soft and active matter, with applications to biological and complex systems.
• Nonequilibrium statistical physics (models such as stochastic lattice gas, coupled Burgers equations, etc.)
• Quantum simulations, Synthetic quantum matter, and Quantum information
• Pulsars and Gravitational Waves (Theory and Data Analysis)

(*) BE/BTECH candidates are eligible for selected areas marked with asterisk

Selection Procedure

During the application process, the candidates will be asked to enter one of the choices among 1) Theoretical, 2) Experimental. The shortlisted applicants will be invited to attend interviews conducted in hybrid mode.

Important Dates

General Information and Application Procedure

1. Applicants should complete the online application form at the url: ( https://phdadmission.iisertvm.ac.in/index.php/applicant/register/27 ).
2. Only applications complete in all respects would be considered. Do not forget to click the “Submit” button after completing your application.
3. Applicants will also be prompted to upload all the supporting documents online.
4. Applicants should provide Name/Affiliation/Contact number and Email addresses of two referees in the application form.
5. Applicants belonging to GEN/OBC and SC/ST/PH categories are required to make a payment of Rs. 500/- and Rs. 250/-, respectively, as a processing fee online through the application portal.
6. On submission of the online application form, the applicants will receive an acknowledgement email with a unique application number.
7. Applicants are NOT required to post a hard copy of the application to IISER TVM.
8. In case of any application-related queries, please contact the Ph.D. coordinator by email at: phdprogramme@iisertvm.ac.in. Any other mode of communication will not be entertained.
9. Mere fulfilment of the eligibility criteria does not entitle a candidate to be called for the interview.
10. Relaxation for reserved categories to the eligibility criteria will be applicable as per Government of India rules.