Dr. K. S. Ajayakumar obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry working at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) for his work on high-Temperature Superconducting Materials. Presently a Vice President and heading the Chemical Detector Division, he joined UEPL at its inception in 1993.

He has carried out extensive research on the different types of chemical detectors and has made a significant contribution to developing more than 120 chemical detector tubes for different gases. He was a joint winner of the NRDC Technology Day Meritorious Invention Award for 2001 and World Intellectual Property Organization Award for 2002. He has also published several papers and holds a patent jointly on chemical detector strips for phosphine.