E-Paper
AU alumnus selected for Boltzmann Medal
The Boltzmann Medal is given out once in three years to honour outstanding achievements in statistical physics. AU alumnus and a renowned physicist , Deepak Dhar is the first Indian to be awarded this prestigious medal.
PRAYAGRAJ: Allahabad University (AU) alumnus and a renowned physicist working as emeritus faculty at the Indian Institute of Science, Education and Research (IISER), Pune, Deepak Dhar has been selected for the prestigious Boltzmann Medal for 2022—the first Indian to ever be awarded this prestigious honour.
He is one of just two physicists selected for the award this time, with the second awardee being John Hopfield from Princeton University.
The Boltzmann Medal, which has been instituted by C3 (Commission on Statistical Physics) of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP), is given out once in three years to honour outstanding achievements in statistical physics.
The award consists of the gilded Boltzmann medal with the inscription of Austrian physicist and philosopher Ludwig Boltzmann.
The two scientists will be presented the medals at the StatPhys28 conference to be held in Tokyo from 7-11 August next year.
Dhar has been given the award “for his seminal contributions to several areas of statistical physics, including exact solutions of self-organised criticality models, inter-facial growth, universal long-time relaxation in disordered magnetic systems, exact solutions in percolation and cluster counting problems and definition of the spectral dimension of fractals.”
“It is a great honour to be selected for this award. We scientists do not research for the sake of getting medals and awards but it is always a good feeling to be recognised,” said Dhar.
Prof Dhar shared that he was originally from Dehradun but was born in Pratapgarh district of Prayagraj division. His father Murli Dhar was a judge in the Allahabad high court and had even served as a president of Allahabad High Court Bar Association.
Prof Deepak Dhar did his BSc from Allahabad University (AU) in 1970. In 1972 he obtained his MSc degree in Physics from IIT-Kanpur before his tryst with research in statistical physics and stochastic processes that goes back a long way, beginning with his PhD in 1978 at the California Institute of Technology.
