Photograph-Prof.-K.T.-JacobK. T. Jacob was educated at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and Imperial College of Science and Technology, London. From 1970 to 1983 he held several academic positions at the University of Toronto. After returning to his alma mater, he served as Chairman of both the Department of Metallurgy and the Materials Research Center at the Indian Institute of Science. He was a Distinguished Professor of the Indian National Academy of Engineering. He is currently Emeritus Professor and Senior Scientist of National Academy of Sciences, India.

Professor Jacob has served on the editorial boards of twelve international journals. He is the author/co-author of 416 scientific papers. He has delivered numerous invited lectures worldwide and has been honoured by several awards. He is a fellow of all the science and engineering academies in India. He was Chair of the Materials Program Advisory Committee of the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, and Chairman of the Research Council of the Central Electrochemical Research Institute. He has held visiting professorships at Tohoku University, Pennsylvania State University, and Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm.

Through his creative research during the past 45 years, Professor K. T. Jacob has made extensive fundamental contributions to the fields of materials extraction, chemical processing of ceramics and materials chemistry. In particular, his contributions to thermodynamics of materials, modelling of high temperature systems and processes, and solid-state sensors for process control and optimisation have provided strong leadership and guided the evolution of research in these areas. Thermodynamic and phase-equilibrium measurements by his group have provided consistently reliable high quality data on systems of crucial importance to emerging technologies.