The National Academy of Sciences, India (NASI) in Allahabad is the oldest of the three scientific academies in India. Founded in the year 1930, with the objectives to provide a national forum for the publication of research work carried out by Indian scientists and to provide opportunities for exchange of views among them, the NASI Memorandum of Association was signed by seven distinguished scientists: Meghnad Saha, K. N. Bahl, D. R. Bhattacharya, P. C. MacMohan, A. C. Banerji, Ch. Wali Mohammad and N. R. Dhar. Several colleagues at the University are currently Fellows of NASI.
In recent collaboration with Elsevier, publishers of numerous scientific journals and books, NASI have introduced the NASI-Scopus Award for young scientists. From the Elsevier site, I gathered that the Elsevier Scopus Awards, started in 2005, recognize and reward the talent, knowledge and expertise of young scientists around the globe in a variety of disciplines. Currently, 15 countries have participated in the award, each marked with an event co-organized by Elsevier with prestigious national consortia, funding body or society. Traditionally, these academic groups nominate an award committee to recognize scholarly output, citations, and prestige of their region’s outstanding researchers across a range of subject areas. Publication and citation information provided by Scopus helps the committee to assess country-wide research strengths and rising talent.
Winners are selected after a fairly rigorous process, so it is particularly gratifying that one of our own has been named the NASI-SCOPUS awardee in Physics for 2013, one of 8 this year: Dr S Venugopal Rao of the ACRHEM.
Venu came to ACRHEM in 2007 from IIT-Guwahati, where he had joined the faculty of the Physics department after a postdoc in Scotland. His doctoral work was at the UoH, on Incoherent Laser Spectroscopy for the measurement of ultra-fast relaxation times and third order nonlinearities in a variety of organic molecules.
The philosophy of the Scopus Awards program is to celebrate science, and this has been emphasised over the years that the awards have been given.
Our heartiest congratulations, Venu!