Abdus Salam - Speech at Nobel Prize Banquet, See Also

Theoretical physicist, born in Jhang Maghiana, C Pakistan. He studied at Punjab University and Cambridge, and became professor of mathematics at the Government College of Lahore and at Punjab University (1951–4). He lectured at Cambridge (1954–6), and became professor of theoretical physics at Imperial College, London (1957), and founder-director of the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste (1964), renamed the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics following his death. In 1979 he shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with Steven Weinberg and Sheldon Glashow for their theory combining both the weak nuclear force and electromagnetic interactions between elementary particles; their predictions were confirmed experimentally in the 1970s and 1980s.

Dr. Abdus Salam (Urdu: پروفیسر ڈاکٹر عبد السلام) (January 29, 1926 at Santokdas, Sahiwal in Punjab – 21 November 1996 in Oxford, England) was a Pakistani theoretical physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1979 for his work in electroweak theory which is the mathematical and conceptual synthesis of the electromagnetic and weak interactions, the latest stage in the effort to provide a unified description of the four fundamental forces of nature. Salam, Sheldon Glashow and Steven Weinberg arrived at the theory independently and shared the prize.

Abdus Salam was an exceptional student in high school.

During the early 1960s Salam played a very significant role in starting Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission and Suparco - country's space agency. Founder and Director of the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), Trieste, Italy from 1964 to December 1993, Salam was a firm believer that "scientific thought is the common heritage of mankind", and that developing nations needed to help themselves and invest into their own scientists to boost development and fill the gap between the rich North and the poor South of the planet, thus contributing to a more peaceful world.

Salam died at 70 in Oxford in 1996, after a long illness.

Professor Salam was a devout muslim who belonged to the Ahmadiyya Community and therefore Abdus Salam is not sufficiently recognized by the Pakistani government for being country's first and only Nobel Laureate.

Speech at Nobel Prize Banquet

During his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize in Physics, Salam famously quoted the following verses from the Quran

"Thou seest not, in the creation of the All-merciful any imperfection, Return thy gaze, seest thou any fissure.

See Also

Pati-Salam model Unified field theory Electroweak interaction Preon W and Z bosons Standard Model Magnetic photon Dirac Prize Supersymmetry Quantum electrodynamics Asian African Association for Plasma Training