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News from ICTP 100 - Monitor
Two distinguished scientists from the Russian Academy of Sciences, Evgeny Pavlovic Velikhov (left) and Dmitry V. Rundqvist (right), have been awarded the Primo Rovis International Prize for their contributions to public understanding of science and technology. Velikhov is a leading authority in such fields as plasma physics, thermonuclear fusion, and electromagnetic acoustics of the Earth's surface. Rundqvist is an internationally renowned geophysicist and director of the Vernadsky National Geological Museum in Moscow. The prize, endowed by Trieste entrepreneur Primo Rovis (centre), carries a US$20,000 cash award.
ICTP library clerk Delia Gatta has retired after 18 years of service to the Centre. Delia's career at ICTP began in 1967 in ICTP's first library in the office building on Piazza Oberdan in downtown Trieste. One year later, she moved to Canada with her husband and first child, returning to Trieste in 1985 to pick up at the Centre where she had left off. Stationed at the loan desk, she was often the first person that staff and visiting scientists encountered when entering the library. Always kind and helpful, staff and scientists alike thank Delia for her years of service and wish her the best in her well-deserved retirement.
ICTP Profiles
The ICTP Public Information Office has published People and
Places, a collection of profiles of scientists who have visited
the Centre over the past several years. Many of the profiles first
appared in New from ICTP. Those interested in obtaining
a copy should contact sci_info@ictp.trieste.it.
Zeenet Kamran Badirkhan, ICTP Regular Associate (1996-2001), recently passed away. She was 42. The Iraqi-born condensed matter physicist had a long-standing relationship with ICTP and, more generally, Trieste's international scientific community. Badirkhan earned a Ph.D. in condensed matter physics in 1990 from the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA). She was appointed a research fellow at ICTP the following year. Badirkhan's major research areas included local ordering and thermodynamics. She taught at Al-Fateh University in Libya and Zarqa College in Jordan.
Abdelbaki Maafi, ICTP Regular Associate (1998-2003) in the field of nonconventional energy, recently passed away at the age of 44. Algerian-born Maafi, who last visited the Centre in 2001, pursued a broad research agenda that included statistical analyses of solar radiation data and mapping, development simulation models of solar radiation, and modelling of photovoltaic systems to improve their storage capacities. Maafi, who received a doctorate in physics at Université des Sciences et de la Technologie Houari Boumedienne in Algiers in 1991, became one of Algeria's youngest senior researchers when he was recently appointed full professor in electronics and applied mathematics at the university where he earned his doctorate.