TWAS at 20

More than 3000 people attended the opening session of the 9th General Conference of the Third World Academy of Sciences (TWAS), held in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on 16 October. China's President, Hu Jintao, addressed the audience, which included representatives from 77 countries. The conference marked the 20th anniversary of TWAS, which is headquartered at ICTP's campus in Trieste. The four-day event ended with the Beijing Declaration which, among other action items, called on developing countries to forge even stronger programmes for South-South cooperation as a primary strategy for promoting science-based development. At the conference, Brazil, China and Mexico each announced that they would provide 50 fellowships for promising young students in the South under a grant programme administered by TWAS. For additional information about the conference, see www.twas.org.

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TRIL's 20th Anniversary
Autumn 2003 marks the 20th anniversary of ICTP's Training and Research in Italian Laboratories (TRIL) programme. The programme enables scientists from the developing world to work in research laboratories throughout Italy. Over the past two decades, TRIL has awarded some 1500 grants to more than 900 fellows from 73 countries. Over 335 Italian laboratories have participated in the programme. For additional information, see www.ictp.it. For a more detailed account of the TRIL programme, see News from ICTP, Spring 1998, pages 12-13.

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Nobel Prize 2003
Three scientists, who have participated in ICTP Condensed Matter Physics group's activities, have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2003.

Alexei A. Abrikosov, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois, USA;

Vitaly L. Ginzburg, P.N. Lebedev Physical Institute, Moscow, Russia;

and Anthony J. Leggett, University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois, USA, have been honoured "for pioneering contributions to the theory of superconductors and superfluids." Abrikosov and Ginzburg lectured at the Adriatico Research Conference in High Temperature Superconductors in 1987. Leggett visited ICTP four times between 1987 and 1996. During his most recent visit, Leggett served as course director of the Workshop on Quantum Dissipation and Applications. For additional information, see www.nobel.se.

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ICTP Prize Winner
Manindra Agrawal, a mathematician with the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India, who is currently conducting research at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, USA, is the winner of the 2003 ICTP Prize. With the help of two undergraduate students (Neeraj Kayal and Nitin Saxena), Agrawal recently deciphered the polynomial-time algorithm for testing whether a given number is a prime number (solving the so-called 'primality problem'). In addition to its importance in number theory, 'primality' plays a key role in computational complexity and is also a fundamental tool of analysis in modern cryptography. The award ceremony will take place later this year in Trieste.

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Master's Students

Incoming students of the Joint Master's Degree Programme
with ICTP director and teachers

The academic year for the 2003-2004 class of the ICTP/SISSA Joint Master's Degree Programme in Modeling and Simulation of Complex Realities officially began on 22 October. The class is comprised of 21 students from 16 countries. The programme was launched in 2001 and graduated its first 'master's' at the end of September.

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UN Day
ICTP director Katepalli R. Sreenivasan hosted the ceremonies for United Nations Day 2003 in the Main Lecture Hall. The event was held on 24 October. More than 300 distinguished guests, scientists and staff were in attendance. The celebration took place just two months after the suicide attack to the UN compound in Baghdad, which killed more than 20 United Nations staff members, including special representative Sergio Vieira de Mello. Their sacrifice was remembered in a video message by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. During the ceremony, remarks were given by Ana María Cetto, IAEA deputy director general; Arturo Falaschi, director, International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB); Graziano Bertogli, deputy managing director, International Centre for Science and High Technology (ICS); and Mohamed Hassan, executive director, Third World Academy of Sciences (TWAS). At the event, five fellowships, sponsored by companies in Trieste and the surrounding region, were given to local high school and university students. There was also an official ceremony honouring Centre employees who have worked with the Centre for more than 20 years, a concert by Quartetto d'archi Tergeste, and the opening of the exhibition "Art for Peace".

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On Display Abroad

Egypt. To celebrate the centennial anniversary of Egypt's National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO) Cairo office organised an international symposium, "Living with Risk: Seismic Hazard, Insurance Sector and Sustainability in the Mediterranean Region," in Egypt's capital city from 6-8 December 2003. ICTP's Office of Structure and Non-Linear Dynamics of the Earth (SAND) group, led by Giuliano F. Panza, served as one of the collaborating institutions. The symposium's concluding resolution recommended that innovative methodologies, such as those developed jointly by the SAND group and University of Trieste seismologists, be used to assess seismic hazards throughout the region and that institutions throughout the Mediterranean basin take advantage of the excellent research and training faculties in Trieste.

Japan. At an exhibition held in conjunction with the 2003 International Symposium on GPS/GNSS, which took place in Tokyo between 15-18 November 2003, ICTP Aeronomy and Radiopropagation Laboratory (ARPL) scientists, led by laboratory head Sandro M. Radicella, displayed and demonstrated ARPL's ionosphere model.

The model, which was developed in partnership with the University of Graz, Austria, has been used in the development of the European Space Agency's satellite-based navigation and positioning systems--EGNOS and GALILEO--scheduled for operation later this decade.

Switzerland. At the World Summit of the Information Society (WSIS), held in Geneva on 7-12 December, ICTP Director Katepalli R. Sreenivasan gave a plenary talk and staff members of ICTP's eJournals Delivery Service (eJDS), led by Hilda Cerdeira, illustrated the broad-ranging research and training initiatives taking place at the Centre to ensure electronic access to up-to-date scientific information for researchers in the developing countries, especially those in the least developed countries.

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