Professor C. N. R. Rao, CSIR Centre for Excellence in Chemistry, Bangalore, India, has received India’s highest civilian honor, the Bharat Ratna (Jewel of India). Rao is an expert on solid state and materials chemistry and has influenced India’s science policy for four decades, with many of India’s scientific resources being developed due to his efforts.

C. N. R. Rao, born in Bangalore, India, in 1934, obtained his bachelor’s degree from Mysore University, India, in 1951. After receiving his Masters degree from Banaras Hindu University, India, he went to Purdue University, USA, where he gained his Ph.D. In 1958, he began his academic career at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, where he stayed for three years. After working in the Department of Chemistry at the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, India, he returned to the Indian Institute of Science in 1976, where he set up a solid state and structural chemistry unit. He has since become an expert in solid state and materials chemistry.
Rao is currently director of the International Centre for Materials Science (ICMS), the National Research Professor, Linus Pauling Research Professor, and Honorary President of Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bangalore, which he founded in 1989.

He has received numerous awards and honors including: the August-Wilhelm-von-Hofmann-Denkmünze (2010) from the German Chemical Society (GDCh), the first International Prize for Materials Science from the Materials Research Society of India (MRSI; 2009), the Royal Medal by the Royal Society (2009), the India Science Award (2004), and the Centenary Medal of the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), London (2000).

Selected publications by Rao:

• Highly Effective Visible-Light-Induced H₂ Generation by Single-Layer 1T-MoS₂ and a Nanocomposite of Few-Layer 2H-MoS₂ with Heavily Nitrogenated Graphene,
  Urmimala Maitra, Uttam Gupta, Mrinmoy De, Ranjan Datta, A. Govindara, C. N. R. Rao,
  Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2013, 52, 13057–13061.
  DOI: 10.1002/anie.201306918
• Oxidation of toluene and other examples of C–H bond activation by CdO₂ and ZnO₂ nanoparticles,
  S. R. Lingampalli, U. Gupta, U. K. Gautam, C. N. R. Rao,
  ChemPlusChem 2013, 78, 837–842.
  DOI: 10.1002/cplu.201300114
• Extraordinary supercapacitor performance of heavily nitrogenated graphene oxide obtained by microwave synthesis,
  K. Gopalakrishnan, A. Govindaraj, C. N. R. Rao,
  J. Mater. Chem. A, 2013, 1, 7563–7565.
  DOI: 10.1039/C3TA11385J
• Sensing behavior of atomically thin-layered MoS₂ transistors,
  D. Late, Y. K. Huang, B. Liu, J. Acharya, S. Shirodkar, J. Luo, A. Yan, D. Charles, U. Waghmare, V. Dravid, C. N. R. Rao,
  ACS Nano, 2013, 7, 4879–4891.
  DOI: 10.1021/nn400026u
• Remarkable Properties of ZnO Heavily Substituted with Nitrogen and Fluorine, ZnO_1-x(N,F)_x,
  Rana Saha, Srikanth Revoju, Vinay I. Hegde, Umesh V. Waghmare, A. Sundaresan, C. N. R. Rao,
  ChemPhysChem, 2013, 14, 2672–2677.
  DOI: 10.1002/cphc.201300305

Graphene