Dr. Safdar Ali Bhatti wins a research grant from Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences

Lahore: Dr. Safdar Ali Bhatti working as Assistant Professor at Department of Physics University of Gujrat, recently won a research grant from Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for the project entitled “Laser Spectroscopy of Negative Ions Relevant to Astrophysical Plasma” to be conducted at University of Gothenburg.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is a most prestigious organization, not the least since they are awarding the Nobel prizes in Physics and Chemistry. The competition for this grant was very high and Dr. Ali is the only applicant other than European countries who won this grant. This grant really acknowledges the competitiveness as a researcher and the quality of his research proposal.

He said that the scientific interest in negative ions is not only at the fundamental level. There are many applications of negative ions in fields such as plasma physics, atmospheric sciences and fusion research. A current hot topic in the field of negative ions is related to astrophysics. Further He told that the purpose of the present research proposal is to investigate the negative molecules/ions of astrophysical interest. In particular, we will search for optical transitions in molecular negative ions of astrophysical interest using the experimental facility at Gothenburg University. The research will focus on small carbon molecules, e.g. C₃H^– or HCCO^–, for which bound excited states have recently been theoretically predicted by Prof. Ryan Fortenberry at Georgia Southern University. Such states can be used directly for identification of spectral structures observed in the interstellar medium. This project will conducted in collaboration with Ryan C. Fortenberry at NASA Ames Research Center, who is modeling molecular negative ions using coupled cluster theory.

Prof. Dag Hanstorp research group leader at Gothenburg University and host of Dr. Ali congratulate him for winning this grant and wrote him that Dr. Ali stay at the host University will strengthen the collaboration between University of Gothenburg and University of Gujrat. Further He wrote that I see this as an important first step towards a long-term collaboration between our two universities. There are, for instance great possibilities for future support for visit for Master and Ph. D. students from University of Gujrat.

Dr. Abdul Majid Head of Physics Department, University of Gujrat, congratulate Dr. Ali for this remarkable achievement and said that winning of such a high competitive research grant shows the excellence of the research project proposed . He further added that his stay at the Gothenburg University will be beneficial for the Department and University of Gujrat.