Deepak Dhar is an Indian theoretical physicist known for his research on statistical physics and stochastic processes. In 2022, he became the first Indian scientist to be selected for the Boltzmann Medal, the highest recognition in statistical physics awarded once every three years by IUPAP for exceptional contributions to the discipline.
Contents
Wiki/Biography
Deepak Dhar was born on Tuesday, 30 October 1951 (age 71 years; as in 2022) in Pratapgarh, Uttar Pradesh. Their zodiac sign is Scorpio. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from Allahabad University in 1970. He was a National Science Talent Search (NSTS) scholar when he joined Allahabad University. In 1972, he earned a master’s degree in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. He moved to the United States in 1978 and enrolled for doctoral studies at the California Institute of Technology under the guidance of John Matthews. He was inspired by reading Reiff’s textbook where he was attracted by the logical structure of physics. His interest in science began because his father would bring home popular science books and ask him to read them. When he was in college, his NSTS advisor Vipin Kumar Aggarwal used to encourage him to read science books apart from textbooks. He used to participate in ‘summer camps’ organized for NSTS scholars. Lectures by eminent scientists and professors used to take place there. When he joined IIT Kanpur, he met fellow students who were interested in pursuing academic careers. In an interview, he had said that the environment at IIT was different from Allahabad, where everyone was interested in Indian Administrative Services. When he was at IIT, he got a chance to interact with lecturers like HS Mani, DC Khan and Kalyan Banerjee. After moving to the US to pursue further studies, she was raised by a local host arranged by the student welfare office at Caltech as new students were required to stay with local hosts at their home for two-three days. In an interview, he said that he had to struggle a lot with the American accent of his professors. As a college student, he enjoyed solving simple math problems he saw in magazines. His entertaining mathematical problems were published in the Sunday supplement pages of magazines.
Deepak Dhar when he was young
Physical Appearance
Height (Approx): 5′ 5″
Hair Colour: Gray (semi-bald)
Eye colour: black
Family
parents and siblings
His father’s name is Murali Dhar and mother’s name is Rama Gupta.
wife and children
Dhar is married to Manju. Together they have two children.
livelihood
After completing his PhD, he returned to India to start his career as a Research Fellow at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). In 1980, after two years of research, he became a full-time fellow and worked until 1986. In 1986, he was promoted to Reader. Before retiring from service, he held various positions in TIFR such as Associate Professor (1991) and Professor grades from G to J (1995–2008). He took a one-year sabbatical from 1984 to 1985 as a visiting scientist at the University of Paris. In May 2006, he spent a month-long tenure at the Isaac Newton Institute as the Rothschild Professor. He was also a distinguished professor at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune. He worked on the statistical mechanics and dynamics of random lattices and his work informs statistical physics and the understanding of stochastic processes. He takes credit for introducing the spectral dimension concept into the study of fractals and contributed to developing a methodology for determining their critical phenomena using real-space renormalization group techniques, which was the first time the mathematical tool was applied to fractals. The calculation was done on non-trivial significant exponents. , He developed a new model, the Dhar–Ramaswamy model, by working with Ramakrishna Ramaswamy to solve the Abelian sandpile model of self-organized criticality. He proposed the growth operator, which was later subjected to study as an edge directed-site animal-counting problem by other researchers working on the directed-site animal-counting problem using the Beth Ansatz method. . He demonstrated the dominance of slow flipping of isolated discontinuous clusters in auto-correlation functions and also proposed models of metastable glassy states in stochastic evolution. About 113 of his studies have been documented in articles by the online article repository of the Indian Academy of Sciences. He serves as Associate Editor of the Springer Publications Journal of Statistical Physics since 2005, where he served on the editorial board from 1993 to 1996 and 1999 to 2002. He is a member of the editorial board of the Indian Journal of Pure and Applied. of Physics (IJPAP) of the National Institute of Science Communication and Information Resources (NISCAIR). He is a former editorial advisor to the Elsevier science journal Physica A, and has been associated with journals such as Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment, Physical Review E and Pramana as a member of the editorial board. He was a member of the Statistical Physics Commission of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics from 1992 to 1995, and a member of the Program Committee of the International Center for Theoretical Sciences. On 19 October 2016, he delivered an invited address and a special lecture on the curious relationship between physics and mathematics at the University of Mumbai.
Fellowship
During his doctoral days at Caltech he received the EP Anthony Fellowship (1972–73) and the RP Feynman Fellowship (1974–76). In 1990, he was elected as a Fellow by the Indian Academy of Sciences. In 1995, he became an elected Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy. In 1999, he was elected as a Fellow by the National Academy of Sciences. In 2006, he was elected a Fellow of the World Academy of Sciences. In 2007, he was selected for the JC Bose National Fellowship of the Science and Engineering Research Board.
Awards, Honors, Achievements
- 1983: Young Scientist Medal of the Indian National Science Academy
- 1991: Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research
- 1993: International Center for Theoretical Physics by J. Robert Schriefer Award
- 2001: Satyendranath Bose Medal by the Indian National Science Academy
- 2002: TWAS Award of the World Academy of Sciences
- 2023: Padma Bhushan
Deepak Dhar receiving the Padma Bhushan award
Facts/General Knowledge
- He was elected a Fellow of all three major Indian Science Academies – the Indian Academy of Sciences, the Indian National Science Academy and the National Science Academy, India. Presently, he is a distinguished professor in the Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune.
- In 2022, he became the first Indian to receive the Boltzmann Medal. The award was shared with John Hopfield.
- After completing his studies, he worked on a model of 3D solid melting, which he later realized was not applicable.
- While he was at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, he found a fellow scientist and friend in Professor Mustansir Burma, with whom he published several papers. He had no mentor there but his colleagues helped him lead his research.
- He was a part of TIFR for four decades where he witnessed many changes. In an interview, he said that the money spent on science is much greater now than it was 40 years ago. He further said that nowadays people read less and write more, which according to him is not always a good thing.
- In 1990, he solved the sandpile model introduced in a 1987 paper by three physicists, Per Bak, Chao Tang, and Kurt Wiesenfeld.
- While working at TIFR, Dhar was able to break down complex concepts into very simple terms. He was renowned for training and influencing a large number of students and colleagues in advancing the style of theoretical statistical physics.
- In an interview, one of his colleagues had said that his desk was always a mess. He further said that only he could find the papers on his desk. His wife used to come to the office and rearrange the table but after some time the table would get damaged.
- When he was a professor, while giving grades, he used to give marks with decimal points. That will give 8.2 or 8.53 instead of 8.
- Many of the students he taught started working as a part of ICTS (International Center for Theoretical Sciences in Bengaluru). His students became the best researchers in the field of theoretical physics.
- In an interview, when he was asked about the impact of the education system at the school level in India, he said,
Yes, I have personally experienced this when I was a child, and later when my daughters started school. In fact, in our schools, we do not enable students to think and move forward for themselves. Even practical training like essay writing, which should be aimed at developing the ability to express one’s thoughts in words, is turned into mindless essays on “Cow”: Cow is a domestic animal. It has two eyes, four legs….” If the student says anything different he is often punished (points are deducted). I found a few teachers who were different, but most were not different.’ ‘
Categories: Biography
Source: vcmp.edu.vn