Rate My Professor Apurba Bera

Dr Apurba Bera serves as an Associate Lecturer and PhD co-supervisor at the Curtin Institute of Radio Astronomy (CIRA) within the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Curtin University. He joined CIRA in late 2022 as part of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), following a postdoctoral fellowship at the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) and a one-year postdoc at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in India. Prior to these roles, Bera completed his PhD at the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (NCRA-TIFR) in Pune, India, in 2021, where his thesis focused on atomic hydrogen in galaxies. He also holds BSc and MSc degrees in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, awarded in 2015.

Bera's research centers on galaxy evolution and radio transients, particularly the properties, polarization, and host galaxies of fast radio bursts (FRBs), as well as atomic hydrogen (HI) scaling relations and gas accretion in star-forming galaxies. As a member of the Commensal Real-time ASKAP Fast Transients (CRAFT) team, he utilizes the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) and other facilities like the upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (uGMRT) and MeerKAT. Key publications include "Atomic hydrogen in star-forming galaxies at intermediate redshifts" (The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 2019), the first measurements of HI masses at z~0.4; "Atomic Hydrogen Scaling Relations at z ≈ 0.35" (ApJL, 2023); "The Gas Accretion Rate of Star-forming Galaxies over 0 < z < 0.4" (ApJL, 2023); "The Curious Case of Twin Fast Radio Bursts: Evidence for Neutron Star Origin?" (ApJL, 2024); and "A depolarization census of ASKAP fast radio bursts" (Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2025). His work on FRB host galaxy HI distributions (Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 2025) and X-ray emitting long-period radio transients has contributed to award-winning research news at Curtin University. Bera frequently presents colloquia, such as on FRB polarization at NCRA-TIFR.