Dhruva Kulkarni

Biographical Sketch

Dhruva Kulkarni is a postdoctoral fellow in NERSC's Exascale Science Application Program (NESAP) for Simulations. Dhruva's research interests include high performance computing, experimental and applied physics, and software engineering and development. He is currently working on performance optimization of the Whole Device Model Application (WDMapp), part of the Exascale Computing Project (ECP). His part of the project aims at evaluating and optimizing the performance of various kernels of WDMApp across different hardware (NVIDIA, AMD, Intel) and software (Kokkos, OpenMP acceleration) stacks, helping to evaluate compiler enhancements sourced from industry vendors, and also conducting performance-centric feasibility studies of machine-learning based future versions of the code.

Before joining NERSC, Dhruva was a 'Staff Software Scientist' at Thermo Fisher Scientific working on the development of control software for triple quad mass spectrometers and FAIMS instruments. Prior to Thermo, Dhruva held dual roles at Verseon Corporation: as a 'Physicist', he primarily worked on development and single core optimization (SIMD) of a molecular dynamics program to predict protein-ligand binding energies, while as the 'Blockchain Architect', Dhruva led the design and development of the blockchain platform for the company's planned security token offering. Prior to his graduate studies, Dhruva was a 'Software Engineer' at Nevis Networks where he developed a high speed stateful traffic generator utilizing a proprietary multi-core hyperthreaded network processor.

Dhruva was awarded a Ph.D. in Physics from Clemson University in May 2017 under the guidance of Prof. Chad Sosolik for researching the transport and energy deposition characteristics of highly charged ions at the Clemon University Electron Electron Beam Ion Trap (CUEBIT) Lab as part of DARPA's Local Control of Materials Synthesis (LoCo) program. He received awards for best teaching assistant at the departmental as well as collegiate levels as a graduate student at Clemson University. Dhruva also holds a master's degree in Physics from Clemson University, and a bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering from PICT, Pune University. In his spare time, Dhruva enjoys volunteering at schools and food banks, and getting involved in science outreach projects.

Journal Publications

E.S. Srinadhu, D.D. Kulkarni, D.A. Field, J.E. Harriss, and C.E. Sosolik (2019): The effects of multicharged ion irradiation on a polycarbonate surface, Radiation Effects and Defects in Solids, DOI: 10.1080/10420150.2018.1552958

D.B. Cutshall, D.D. Kulkarni, J.E. Harriss, D.A. Field, C.E. Sosolik, W.R. Harrell, “Effects of slow highly charged ion irradiation on metal oxide semiconductor capacitors”, Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology, 36 052901 (2018)

D.B. Cutshall, D.D. Kulkarni, J.E. Harriss, W.R. Harrell, and C.E. Sosolik, “Tracking ion irradiation effects using buried interface devices”, Nuclear Instrument and Methods in Physics Research “B”, 422 47 (2018)

D. D. Kulkarni, C. D. Ahl, A. M. Shore, A. J. Miller, J. E. Harriss, C. E. Sosolik, and J. P. Marler, “Kinetic energy offsets for multicharged ions from an electron beam ion source”, Review of Scientific Instruments 88 083306 (2017) http://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/1.4999902) (Featured as an editor’s pick)

D.D. Kulkarni, D.A. Field, D.B. Cutshall, J.E. Harriss, W.R. Harrell, and C.E. Sosolik, “Probing kinetically excited hot electrons using Schottky diodes”, Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology “B” 35 03D103 (2017) (Featured as an editor’s pick)

D.D. Kulkarni, L.A.M. Lyle, C.E. Sosolik, “Ion transport through macrocapillaries - oscillations due to charge patch formation”, Nuclear Instrument and Methods in Physics Research “B”, 382 54 ( 2016)

D.D. Kulkarni*, R.E. Shyam*, D.A. Field, E.S. Srinadhu, J.E. Harriss, W.R. Harrell, C.E. Sosolik “Encapsulating Ion-Solid Interactions in Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (MOS) Devices”, Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Transactions in Nuclear Science 62 3346 (2015) *DDK and RES shared first authorship

D.D. Kulkarni, R.E. Shyam, D.B. Cutshall, D.A. Field, J.E. Harriss, W.R. Harrell, C.E. Sosolik, “Tracking subsurface ion radiation damage with metal–oxide–semiconductor device encapsulation”, Journal of Materials Research 30 1413 (2015)

Conference Papers

C.E. Sosolik, D.D. Kulkarni, D.A. Field, E.S. Srinadhu, D.B. Cutshall, W.R. Harrell, and J.E. Harriss, “Recent results from the ion beam laboratories at Clemson University,” 21 st International Workshop on Inelastic Ion-Surface Collisions, p. 66, October (2015)

R.E. Shyam, D.D. Kulkarni, D.A. Field, E.S. Srinadhu, D.B. Cutshall, W.R. Harrell, J.E. Harriss, C.E. Sosolik, “First multicharged ion irradiation results from the CUEBIT facility at Clemson University”, AIP Conference Proceedings 1640 129 (2015)