Saurav Gautam

Saurav Gautam joined UC Merced’s Department of Mechanical Engineering in Fall 2019 as a Ph.D. student. Before joining UC Merced, he received his master’s degree in Physics from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and a bachelor's degree in Applied Physics from Kathmandu University, Nepal. His research at UL Lafayette was related to the study of onset and steady-state dynamics of atmospheric pressure dielectric barrier discharge. As a part of the same research, he developed his own Python-based open-source software named ‘PyDBD’ and made it freely available for use to the plasma community. Previously, as an undergraduate student, he got the opportunity to hone his skills in experimental plasma physics by working as a research volunteer at Kathmandu University’s plasma physics laboratory. At UC Merced, Gautam is a member of Prof. Venkattraman Ayyaswamy’s research group. He recently completed a project related to the study of high-frequency impedance characteristics of plasma capacitor, and is currently working on the development and assessment of an in-house plasma modeling software named SOMAFOAM. Besides, Gautam has now also gathered work experience as an intern in the semiconductor industry. He worked as a research intern at Lam Research Corp. in summer 2021 and fall 2021 semesters. During the internship, his role was to support activities involving plasma modeling and simulation for Etch CE C&F group. Gautam's research interests lie in the areas of tunable electronics, plasma capacitor, plasma antenna, microelectromechanical systems, plasma processing, plasma medicine, etc. Outside of academia, he is a self-taught painter and also a music enthusiast.