Hailed as one of the world’s best theoretical physicists of the 20th century, Nobel Laureate Prof Dr Abdus Salam is relatively unknown in his home country and his contributions even more so.
This was stated by some of the world’s top physicists and mathematicians on Saturday while paying tribute to Salam’s scientific work at a seminar arranged by Government College University (GCU) Lahore’s Abdus Salam School of Mathematical Sciences (ASSMS).
“Salam should have also been given the Nobel Prize for Peace because of his outstanding efforts for the international collaborative science and the development of scientific culture in third world countries,” said Prof Dr Michael Duff from Imperial College London in his video message for the seminar. He also explained in detail the four big ideas in contemporary physics to which Salam contributed significantly.
In his video address, Professor Fernando Quevedo, Director of the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Italy, said that apart from his work on the standard model, for which Salam had been awarded the Nobel Prize, the list of his lasting contributions to theoretical physics was long and their impact was deep. He added that Salam had been the pioneer of the idea to go beyond the standard model of physics.
Harvard’s Dr Cumrun Vafa also sent a video message to pay tribute to Dr Salam, saying that besides the electroweak unification theory, the establishment of the ICTP was the Salam’s biggest contribution to science.
The speakers also shared their memories of working with Salam while celebrating his 91st birthday at the seminar.
Addressing the seminar, Dr Jamil Aslam discussed electroweak unification, the work for which Abdus Salam won the Noble prize together with Steven Weinberg and Sheldon Glashow. Other speakers included Dr Amer Iqbal who explained the mathematics behind symmetry and how particles are able to have mass, and Dr Rizwan Khalid who discussed the idea of grand unification.
The speakers also said that Dr Salam’s achievements were not confined to the Nobel Prize. At the age of 33, he became Fellow of the Royal Society, London. At the age of 38, Salam became the Director of the ICTP. For his contributions towards peace and the promotion of international collaboration, Dr Salam was awarded the Atoms for Peace Medal. He was a fellow and member of more than 30 academies/societies around the world and was awarded honorary doctorates by more than 40 universities.
