First Indian to get Boltzmann Medal | 08 Mar 2022

Why in News?

Recently, the prestigious Boltzmann Medal for the year 2022 has been awarded to Professor Deepak Dhar.

  • He became the first Indian to win this award and shared the award with American scientist John Hopfield.
  • The chosen two scientists will be presented the medals at the StatPhys28 conference to be held in Tokyo in August, 2022.

What is the Boltzman Medal?

  • This medal is awarded every three years by the Commission on Statistical Physics of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) at the Statphys Conference.
    • The IUPAP was established in 1922 in Brussels with 13 Member countries and the first General Assembly was held in 1923 in Paris. It currently has 60 country members. India joined it in 1948.
    • It is the only international physics organisation that is organised and run by the physics community itself.
  • The award comprises medals and honours for the contribution in Statistical Physics. The award consists of the gilded Boltzmann medal with the inscription of Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann.
    • Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann was an Austrian physicist and philosopher.
  • It is given only once to a person and on the condition that that person has not won the Nobel prize so far.
  • It was initiated in 1975, with Nobel laureate (1982) K.G. Wilson being the first recipient.

Who is Professor Deepak Dhar?

  • Professor Dhar was born 1951 and completed his graduation in Science in 1970 from University of Allahabad, then Masters in Physics from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur in 1972. Then he went to the US for PhD.
  • Joined Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) as a research fellow in 1978. He worked at TIFR over the years as a full-time professor and retired in 2016.
  • Since then, he has joined Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune (IISER) as a visiting faculty.

Why was he Awarded the Medal?

  • He has been chosen for this award for his contributions in the field of statistical physics, including universal long-time relaxation in disordered magnetic systems, exact solutions in percolation and cluster counting problems and definition of spectral dimension of fractals.

PYQ

Consider the following statements: (2008)

Orange Prize is awarded to a work of published fiction in English by a woman.

Pulitzer Prize is awarded by the Commonwealth Foundation to a citizen of any Commonwealth country for any literary work in English.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only

(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2

Ans: (a)

Source:IE