2013
Mumbai, India
Where curiosity became circuits
B.E. Electronics Engineering, University of Mumbai — Vidyalankar Institute of Technology. Embedded systems and integrated circuits light the first spark.
Dr.
CHANDRAMAN
CHANDRAMAN
PATIL
01 — Identity
A scientist who builds —
from the atom to the warehouse floor.
Research across — GWU · University of Florida · NIST · Naval Research Lab · UCLA · UT Austin · UPenn · imec/Ghent
I design, nano-fabricate, and test photonic and optoelectronic devices — the light-speed hardware beneath next-generation computing, communication, and sensing.
My doctoral work at George Washington University helped establish strainoptronics — bending 2D crystals to control how they see light — published in Nature Photonics and now cited more than 360 times. Along the way I invented an automated 2D Material Transfer System that Applied Physics Reviews named a Featured Article of the Year.
Today I take the same rigor from the cleanroom to the concrete: leading the deployment of autonomous mobile robot fleets in live warehouses — customers, infrastructure, research, end to end.
02 — The Journey
Thirteen years,
one continuous experiment.
2017
Washington, D.C.
Into the nanoscale
M.S. Computer Engineering at The George Washington University — VLSI, MEMS, and a first encounter with photonics that changes everything.
2019
Doctoral research
Ph.D. — Photonics
Doctor of Philosophy in Computer Engineering at GWU. Designing, fabricating, and testing nanophotonic devices at >100 GHz test benches.
2020
Nature Photonics
Strainoptronics is born
Strain-engineered MoTe₂ photodetector for silicon photonic circuits. Journal Cover Page Award · 360+ citations · covered by Science Daily and Phys.org.
2022
Applied Physics Reviews
Machines that build with atoms
The 2D Material Transfer System — Featured Article of the Year. US patent received for manufacturing strained-2D photonic devices.
2023
University of Florida
Research Assistant Professor
Research faculty at Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville — Photonic AI accelerators, Modulators, and Optical Logic Gates.
2024
HUMRO — Cary, NC
From cleanroom to Concrete
Lead Robotics Research Engineer. End-to-end deployment and scaling of autonomous mobile robot fleet solutions and research in production warehouses.
→
Next
Light-speed intelligence
Photonic computing meets embodied machines — hardware that thinks in photons and acts in the physical world.
03 — Selected Research
Publications,
hung like exhibition pieces.
1,019 citations · h-index 14 · Google Scholar, July 2026 ↗
01
Strain-engineered high-responsivity MoTe₂ photodetector for silicon photonic integrated circuits
Bending a 2D crystal changes how it sees light — a foundation of strainoptronics, and a new class of detector for silicon photonics. ✦ Journal coverScience DailyPhys.org 02Highly accurate, reliable, and non-contaminating two-dimensional material transfer system
2DMTS — an automated, AI-assisted robotic platform that places atomically thin flakes with cleanroom precision. ✦ Featured Article of the YearInvention 03Integrated ultra-high-performance graphene optical modulator
Graphene on photonics: electro-optic modulation engineered for speed and efficiency at telecom wavelengths. 2D materialsTelecom 04Self-driven highly responsive PN junction InSe heterostructure near-infrared light detector
A van der Waals junction that detects near-infrared light with zero external power — sensing at ultralow energy. Self-poweredNIR sensing 05Multiplexed orbital angular momentum beams demultiplexing using hybrid optical-electronic convolutional neural network
Untwisting structured light through turbulence with a hybrid optical-electronic neural network — photonics doing AI's work. Photonic AIFree-space optics 06Strain-induced spatially resolved charge transport in 2H-MoTe₂
Mapping how mechanical strain steers electrons through a 2D semiconductor, at the nanoscale. ✦ Journal coverNanoscale transport04 — Systems of Expertise
Four disciplines,
one instrument.
Photonic Integrated Circuits
Design, nano-fabrication, and characterization of on-chip optical devices — modulators, detectors, resonators — measured on ultra-high-bandwidth benches beyond 100 GHz.
2D Materials & Strainoptronics
Atomically thin semiconductors — MoTe₂, InSe, graphene, MXenes — integrated onto photonics, with mechanical strain as a design dial for how they absorb and emit light.
Photonic AI & Accelerators
Neural networks that run on light — optical logic gates, femtojoule-per-bit modulators, and hybrid optical-electronic processors for computing at photon speed.
Autonomous Robotics
AMR, AGV, and UGV systems taken from applied research to production — fleet behavior, warehouse infrastructure integration, and the customer engagements that make them stick.
MoTe₂✦InSe✦Graphene✦MXenes✦Transparent Conductive Oxides / Indium Tin Oxides✦Si & SiN Photonics✦Cleanroom Nanofab✦Giga Hertz Test Benches✦Electro-Optic Metrology✦AMR✦AGV✦UGV✦Fleet Management Software✦Lab-to-Market Prototypes✦Optical System Design and Testing✦
MoTe₂✦InSe✦Graphene✦MXenes✦Transparent Conductive Oxides / Indium Tin Oxides✦Si & SiN Photonics✦Cleanroom Nanofab✦Giga Hertz Test Benches✦Electro-Optic Metrology✦AMR✦AGV✦UGV✦Fleet Management Software✦Lab-to-Market Prototypes✦Optical System Design and Testing✦
05 — Flagship Work
Four chapters
of applied physics.
Chapter I — Invention
Machines that build with atoms.
The 2D Material Transfer System (2DMTS): an automated, AI-assisted robotic platform that lifts and places atomically thin flakes — accurately, repeatably, without contamination — turning a dark art of nanofabrication into a process.
- RecognitionFeatured Article of the Year — Appl. Physics Reviews
- RoleInventor · lead author
- Reach47 citations · adopted lab-wide
- StackRobotics · machine vision · cleanroom process
Chapter II — Discovery
Bending crystals to catch light.
Strainoptronics: stretch a 2D semiconductor and its band structure moves — so a MoTe₂ flake draped over a silicon waveguide becomes a high-responsivity photodetector at telecom wavelengths. Published in Nature Photonics; protected by a US patent family.
- VenueNature Photonics · journal cover · 2020
- Impact360+ citations
- PatentUS 2022/0373751 A1 — strained 2D photonic device
- PressScience Daily · Phys.org · GW Today
Chapter III — Acceleration
Computing at the speed of light.
Photonic AI hardware: coupling-based ITO modulators reaching toward 1 fJ/bit, reconfigurable optical logic gates, and hybrid optical-electronic neural networks that untangle structured light through atmospheric turbulence.
- PatentOptical NN accelerator — US App. 19/273,647 · 2026
- Efficiency1 fJ/bit monolithic modulation
- ResultOAM demultiplexing via hybrid CNN — Comms. Physics
- WhereGWU → University of Florida ECE
Chapter IV — Deployment · 2024 — present
From cleanroom
to concrete.
At HUMRO, the laboratory discipline goes to work: leading end-to-end deployment and scaling of autonomous mobile robot fleets in live warehouse environments — customer engagements, cross-functional teams, infrastructure integration, and the applied research that keeps the fleet getting smarter.
- RoleLead Robotics Research Engineer
- ScopeEnd-to-end: research → integration → scale
- SystemsAMR · AGV · UGV fleets
- BaseCary, North Carolina
06 — Measures
The record,
in numbers.
0+
Citations
Google Scholar
Google Scholar
0
Publications
journals · conferences
journals · conferences
0
h-index
0
i10-index
0
Patent families
granted app · pending
granted app · pending
NCSA nanoMFG Fellow✦MOC Best-Paper Award, Japan✦3 journal cover / feature awards✦Reviewer — Optica · Nanophotonics · EPJ Quantum Tech
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.”
Albert Einstein — carried from Mumbai to Washington
Great engineering begins with scientific curiosity — and ends as something real in the world.
07 — Recognition
Awards, juries,
and rolling credits.
- MOC Student Award — best paper26th Microoptics Conference · Japan2021
- NCSA nanoMFG FellowshipNational Center for Supercomputing Applications2021
- Sprawcew ScholarshipThe George Washington University2021–22
- Journal coverNature Photonics — strain-engineered MoTe₂ photodetector2020
- Journal coverACS Applied Electronic Materials — strain-induced transport2021
- Featured Article of the YearApplied Physics Reviews — 2D Material Transfer System2022
- In the pressScience Daily · Phys.org · GW Today2020
- Peer reviewerOptica · Nanophotonics · EPJ Quantum TechnologyOngoing
- Review EditorFrontiers in Electronics — Flexible Electronics editorial boardOngoing
08 — Trajectory
Where the work
goes next.
↗Photonic AIAccelerators that compute in photons — optical logic, tensor cores, fJ/bit links
↗Mid-IR PhotonicsSensing deeper into the spectrum — chemistry, health, environment
↗MXene DevicesEmerging 2D conductors for flexible, transparent optoelectronics
↗Intelligent Mfg.Lab-to-market automation — machines that fabricate at atomic precision
↗Autonomy at ScaleRobot fleets as infrastructure — perception, coordination, deployment
09 — Contact
Let’s build the future
together.
Research collaborations, robotics deployments, speaking, or a hard problem that needs both a scientist and an engineer — the door is open.