The discovery of methods for cooling, trapping and manipulating atoms and molecules has generated an exciting opportunity to study atomic and molecular interactions at ultracold temperaturs (T

My other research projects involve study of chemical reactions in strong and intense laser fields and investigation of molecular phenomena in the earth's atmosphere and in astrophysics.


Computational requirements:

Much of the calculations are currently being carried out in a set of DEC-alpha workstations at the Institute of Theoretical Atomic and Molecular Physics, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The computer programs makes used of extensive linear algebra as well as fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithms. The programming language is FORTRAN. I would require a UNIX platform with f77/f90 compiler at the workshop.


Publications:

I have published over 35 papers in peer reviewed journals in Chemistry, Physics and Astrophysics. Some of my most recent publications are given below. Further details of my research interests and a list of publications can be found at
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~nbala.

• N. Balakrishnan, A. Dalgarno, and R. C. Forrey, Vibrational relaxation of CO by 4He at ultralow temperatures, J. Chem. Phys. 113, 621 (2000).
  
• A. Alekseyev, H.-P. Liebermann, R. J. Buenker, N. Balakrishnan, H. R. Sadeghpour, S. T. Cornett and M. J. Cavagnero, Spin-orbit effects in photodissociation of Sodium Iodide, J. Chem. Phys. 113,1514 (2000).
  
• N. Balakrishnan, M. Jameison, A. Dalgarno, Y. Li, and R. J. Buenker, Time-dependent quantum mechanical study of photodissociation of molecular oxygen in the Schumann-Runge continuum, J. Chem. Phys. 112, 1255 (2000).
  
• N. Balakrishnan, E. Sergueeva, V. Kharchenko, and A. Dalagarno, Kinetics and thermalization of hot N atoms in the atmosphere, J. Geophys. Res. 105, 18549 (2000).