In 1996, he took an industrial position at the General Electric Company (GE Plastics) and he has been issued patents in the areas of polymer processing and polymer product development. In 2000, he rejoined the University of Alberta as Associate Professor. In 2002, he became the Associate Chair-Chemical Engineering.
Prof. Sundararaj’s main research interests are in processing of polymer blends and nanocomposites. He is particularly known for his work on blend morphology development during processing and for the effect of reaction and block copolymers on coalescence in polymer blends. He is also recognized for his work in miniature mixing equipment including the design of new processing equipment to melt-blend small amounts of material. His recent research includes visualization and modeling of blend structure generation in twin-screw extruders, and processing and properties of novel polymer nanocomposites.
He has received several university awards at the University of Alberta and the University of Minnesota, and several corporate awards during his time at General Electric. He was a Visiting Researcher at Dupont Corporate Research in 1995. He has won three best paper awards and he has given eleven (11) invited presentations at major conferences, including the invited Lambla award lecture at the 2003 PPS meeting in Melbourne, Australia.