Boltzmann Medal: In 2022, Professor Deepak Dhar made history by becoming the first Indian to receive the prestigious Boltzmann Medal. He shares this esteemed award with American scientist John Hopfield. The medals will be presented to both scientists at the StatPhys28 conference scheduled to take place in Tokyo in August 2022.
About Boltzmann Medal
- The Boltzmann medal is awarded by the Commission on Statistical Physics (C3) of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics.
- The award was initiated in 1975, with Nobel laureate (1982) K.G. Wilson was the first recipient.
- Deepak Dhar, physicist from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune, has been selected for the Boltzmann medal.
- He became the first Indian to win this award. He shares the platform with American scientist John J. Hopfield who is known for his invention of an associative neural network, now named after him.
- The award consists of the gilded Boltzmann medal with the inscription of Ludwig Boltzmann. The chosen two scientists will be presented the medals at the StatPhys28 conference to be held in Tokyo, 7-11 August, 2023.
Who is Professor Deepak Dhar?
- Professor Dhar was born in 1951. He completed his undergraduate studies in Science in 1970 at the University of Allahabad. Following that, he pursued a Master’s in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, graduating in 1972. He then traveled to the United States to pursue his Ph.D.
- In 1978, Professor Dhar became a research fellow at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). Over the years, he dedicated his time and expertise to TIFR, eventually becoming a full-time professor. In 2016, he retired from his position.
- Post-retirement, Professor Dhar has continued to contribute to academia. He has taken on a role as a visiting faculty member at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune (IISER).
Why was he Awarded the Medal?
He’s receiving this award because of his outstanding work in statistical physics. His contributions include unraveling the mysteries of how disordered magnetic systems relax over long periods, finding precise solutions to percolation and cluster counting problems, and defining the spectral dimension of fractals.
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