The Foundation is governed by a Board of Directors that is responsible for developing programs to meet the mission and goals of the Foundation, to recommend projects for funding, to monitor the projects, and to assist in the publication of research results.


Professor K. Tahir Shah, Founding Board Member and CEO


K. Tahir Shah, Managing Editor of The African Physical Review and Editor/Moderator of eprints Open Access Archive at the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, is also a (external) Professor of Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Modeling, at the Faculty of Engineering, University of Trieste, Trieste, Italy. He is also a member of the international editorial councils of "Problems of Theory and Methods of Education" (in Russian), Moscow, Russia and "Revista Cubana de Informatica Medica", Havana, Cuba.

Professor Shah authored a large number of papers and co-edited two books. He was a Professor of Mathematics in Tripoli, Libya, and Constantine, Algeria, and a reviewer for Mathematical Reviews, USA, during the 1970s. In 1980s, he moved to Canadian industry designing intelligent software and digital measuring devices. He also held a few management positions during this period.


Professor Arifulla Khan, Founding Board Member

Arifulla Khan, medical director and main investigator at the Northwest Clinical Research Center, Bellevue, Washington, is a Board Certified Psychiatrist, Adjunct Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Duke University, School of Medicine, and Associate Clinical Professor at the University of Washington, USA.

Professor Khan has published over 100 scientific papers. He serves as reviewer for such journals as The Archives of General Psychiatry, The American Journal of Psychiatry, and Biological Psychiatry. He was extensively involved in research leading to the development of medications such as Prozac, Zoloft, Paxcil, Wellbutrin, Effexor, Serzone, Remeron, Celexa and Buspar.


Professor Ahmed Ali, Chairperson, Prize Committee for M.A.B. Bég Prize in Physics

Ahmed Ali, a theoretical physicist and a staff member at the German high energy physics laboratory DESY in Hamburg, is a Professor of Physics at the University of Hamburg and an Adjunct Professor at the National Center of Physics, Islamabad, Pakistan. Professor Ahmed Ali is also an Associate Editor of the journal European High Energy Physics C (Particles and Fields), published jointly by the Societá Italiana di Fisica, EDP Sciences, and the Springer Verlag, Heidelberg.

He is the author and co-author of about 200 research papers and has edited/co-edited ten books on various aspects of high energy physics, including a memorial volume on M.A.B. Bég. In the past, he has taught high energy physics at UCLA, and at the Universities of Munich and Hannover, Germany. He has also worked as a scientific associate at CERN, Geneva, the Abdus Salam ICTP, Trieste, and the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. He has served on various international committees, among them the advisory committee of the Particle Data Group, LBL, and the international conferences on flavor physics, which is also the principal focus of his research.


Professor Vinod Krishan, Member, Prize Committee for M.A.B.Bég Prize in Physics

Vinod Krishan is at present a Senior Professor and the Dean of Sciences at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore, India. She has been an associate and a senior associate of the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste and has actively participated in Plasma Physics activities. She is a Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, India; a recipient of the Vikram Sarabahi Award for Space Sciences; editor of the Bulletin of the Astronomical Society of India; member of the editorial board of the African Physical Review and a visiting professor at the Raman Research Institute, Bangalore.

Professor Krishan has published a large number of papers on various problems in astrophysical plasmas, in particular on the non-thermal radio bursts from the Sun, coronal plasma and convective structures, magnetic transport in partially ionized plasmas, solar wind turbulence, plasma processes in active galactic nuclei and the rotation curves in galaxies. She has edited several proceedings and authored a text book titled Astrophysical Plasmas and Fluids published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1999. She has been a visiting professor at several universities and institutions in different countries.


Professor Ebrahim Shirani, Member, Prize Committee for M.A.B. Bég Prize in Physics

Professor Shirani is currently Professor and Head of the Mechanical Engineering Department, Isfahan University of Technology (IUT) Iran; Director and Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Applied Fluid Mechanics; Senior Associate Member of the Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics; an invited member of Iranian Academy of Science; and a member of Asian Fluid Mechanics Committee.

Professor Shirani has published a large number of research papers and several books. He has been a faculty member of Isfahan University of Technology since 1981, where he held the position of Vice-Chancellor for Research (1998-2002, 2004-05); Head of Mechanical Engineering Department (1985-87, 1992-96); Chairman of Underwater Research Center (1998-2001) and Head of the Center of Excellence for Environmental Nanotechnology (2005-07). He is a distinguished professor of mechanical engineering in Iran and has received several awards for his outstanding contribution to scientific and organizational achievements. The awards include: Outstanding Faculty Member of Universities in Iran; Outstanding Research Administrator in Iran; Outstanding Faculty Member of Mechanical Engineering Departments in Iran awarded by the Iranian Society of Mechanical Engineering; Outstanding Faculty Member of the Isfahan University of Technology in Academic Affairs; and Outstanding Faculty Member of Isfahan University of Technology in Research Affairs. One of his books is selected as the Best Book by Teheran University.


Professor M. Iqbal Choudhary, Chairperson, Prize Committee for Salimuzzaman Siddiqui prize in Chemistry

M. Iqbal Choudhary is presently the Acting Director of International Center for Chemical and Biological Sciences (ICCBS), University of Karachi, Pakistan; Co-Director of the Dr. Panjwani Centre for Molecular Medicine and Drug Research (PCMD); Convener, National Core Group in Chemistry (NCGC); and Professor of Bio-Organic Chemistry at ICCBS. He is a fellow of the academy of sciences for the developing world (TWAS), the Islamic Academy of Sciences (IAS) and Pakistan Academy of Sciences (PAS). He is also member of the National Commission on Science and Technology, Pakistan and the Swiss Chemical Society.

Professor Choudhary is author of over 500 research publications and 12 books. He has edited/co-edited several journals. He also held positions such as Secretary General of the Chemical Society of Pakistan. For his contributions in chemical science research, he has been conferred Hilal-e-Imtiaz (2007), Sitara-e-Imtiaz (2001) and Tamgha-e-Imtiaz (1998) national award by the President of Pakistan. His contributions have also been appreciated internationally and he was awarded the Khwarzmi International Award and Prize from the President of Islamic Republic of Iran (2006) and ECO Prize in Education (2006) by the President of Azerbaijan.