Deadline of submission of manuscripts is August 1, 2005. Submission of workshop proposals on Physics Education is on July 15, 2005.

Travel and Accommodation
    Iloilo City is on the island of Panay, in the western part of the Visayas region, located in the central Philippines. It is connected by daily flights to Manila. Iloilo is a gateway to the region’s remarkable beach resorts, and it also boasts of some of the country’s best examples of heritage architecture.
    A list of accommodations in Iloilo City close to the venue is available from the SPP National Secretariat.

Information and Correspondence
    For further information regarding important dates, author instructions and registration fees, please visit the website: http://www.nip.upd.edu.ph/spp.

    For other inquiries, please contact Dr. Cristine Villagonzalo, the Secretary-General, via e-mail: spp@nip.upd.edu.ph or through telefax: +63-2-436-5341.

 

Belic and Saloma Share Galileo Galilei Award 2004
An insight into leading optics activities in a global community


    Every year ICO awards the Galileo Galilei medal to scientists who have made outstanding contributions to the field of optics under comparatively unfavourable circumstances. The 2004 award went to Prof. Milivoj Belic and Prof. Caesar Saloma.
    Belic was born in 1951 in what was then Yugoslavia. In 1975 he left to pursue graduate studies at the City College of New York in the US. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in 1980, under Joel Gersten and Melvin Lax. In 1981 he returned to Yugoslavia and accepted a junior position at the Institute of Physics, Belgrade. He has remained with the Institute ever since.
    Belic’s research interests centred on optics from the beginning, particularly on nonlinear optics and the nonlinear dynamics of optical systems. His work in nonlinear optics was concerned with wave mixing, optical computing and spatial solitons.
    In nonlinear dynamics, Belic’s work involved the development of optical instabilities and chaos, transverse pattern formation and the dynamics of defects. In other areas, such as condensed-matter physics, he worked on photorefractive materials and defects. In computational physics he was instrumental over a span of three decades in developing ever more sophisticated numerical algorithms for the treatment of systems of PDE in space and time.
    Although his work in Yugoslavia was carried out using very limited resources, Belic succeeded in obtaining exact analytical solutions to various two-wave and four-wave mixing arrangements in photorefractive media. In the1990s his interest shifted to phase conjugate oscillators, and he formulated working conditions for these devices and applied them to optical computing.
    During the past few years Belic has introduced and demonstrated, with the help of experimental colleagues, the existence of counter-propagating 2D vector solitons and bidirectional waveguides in SBN crystals. Currently he is concerned with the dynamics of counter-propagating solitons and self-trapped beams in saturable non-local media.
    His most important contribution to date is the establishment and maintenance of a strong research group in Belgrade, working under adverse conditions yet producing outstanding results. The initial years of political unrest were followed by economic break-down and hyper-inflation, sanctions and deteriorating conditions: times with no electricity, heating or gas, food shortages and falling bombs. It was difficult to do physics when the order of the day was physical survival. Yet, over the years Belic produced a steady stream of high-quality papers which were published in the leading physics journals. He is currently a visiting professor at the Texas A&M University at Qatar in Doha.
    Saloma is a professor of physics at the National Institute of Physics of the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City. Between 1987 and 1989 he was at the Department of Applied Physics, Osaka University, to perform research for his Ph.D. dissertation under the supervision of Shigeo Minami and Satoshi Kawata. His work dealt with temporal coherence control of semiconductor lasers as light sources in optical microscopy.
    In 1989 Saloma returned to the University of the Philippines as an assistant professor and started a research group in optical microscopy and signal processing. In 1994 he spent a year at the Osaka National Research Institute on a postdoctoral fellowship from the Science and Technology Authority of Japan, where he worked on the use of optical feedback detection in optical microscopy.
    In 1996 Saloma became a visiting professor at the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology of Osaka University and worked with Hisato Kondoh on the use of the laser fluorescence confocal microscopy in imaging optically thick biological samples.
    Saloma has also investigated the efficiency of laser confocal microscopy and multi-photon excitation microscopy for imaging applications in highly scattering media. He collaborated with Satoshi Kawata on studying the potential use of two-photon fluorescence microscopy for observing biological samples in turbid media. Saloma and his team are now using a home-built hydrogen Raman shifter as a light source for two-colour (two-photon) fluorescence excitation and the two-colour generation of optical beam-induced current in semiconductor devices. Together with engineers from Intel Technology Philippines, he is developing new ways of detecting defects in backside integrated circuits. His team is also collaborating with marine biologists in the Philippines on classifying coral reefs and sea grasses by remote sensing.
    To date, Saloma has successfully trained 10 Ph.D. students at the University of the Philippines. In 2000 he became director of the National Institute of Physics and is currently serving his second term until 2006. He has been working on ways to improve the quality and efficiency of its graduate-school programmes. His efforts recognize that talented young Filipinos migrate to developed countries because of the lack of viable graduate schools in the Philippines, where there are fewer than 100 holders of PhDs in physics.
    Saloma was president of the Physical Society of the Philippines from 1997 to 2000. He is currently a council member of the Association of Asia-Pacific Physical Societies. He is also an associate member of the Abdus Salam International Centrefor Theoretical Physics and a member of the Optical Societyof America.
    The call for the ICO Galileo Galilei Award 2005 is still open (deadline: 15 April 2005). Colleagues interested in making nominations or obtaining information can visit www.ico-optics.org/awards.html.
    The Award Committee consists of Gert Von Bally (chair), Anna Consortini, Henryk Kasprzak, Serguey Odoulov and Maria J. Yzuel. [Please go to ICO website in which all the information and characteristics of the call appear: http://www.ico-optics.org/awards.html. The permission for reprinting the present news, as published previously in ICO Newsletter, April 2005, wasgranted through Professor Maria L. Calvo, Secretary of ICO (International Commission for Optics).]



Three Physicists Win the King Faisal International Prize


    The King Faisal Foundation in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia announced that Federico Capasso, Frank Wilczek and Anton Zeilinger have jointly won the 2005 King Faisal International Prize for Science. The prize consists of a certificate, hand-written in Diwani calligraphy, summarizing the laureate’s work; acommemorative 24 carat, 200 gram gold medal, uniquely castfor each Prize; and a cash endowment of Saudi Riyal 750,000 (about US$200,000) to be shared equally. The recipients were honoured in a ceremony on 9 April.
    The prizes are named after the third king of Saudi Arabia. In the year 1976, the sons of late King Faisal (1906-1975) established a large-scale philanthropic organization based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and named it as King Faisal Foundation (KFF). One of the activities of the KFF is the King Faisal International Prize (KFIP), to honour scholars and scientists, who have made the most significant advances to benefit humanity and enrich human knowledge. The annual prizes are infive broad categories. Prizes for Arabic Literature, Islamic Studies, and Services to Islam, were first given in 1979. Science and Medicine were introduced in 1982 and 1983 respectively. Each year the selection committee designates subjects or subcategories to each of the above five. The science subcategories cover a broad scope: physics, mathematics, chemistry, and biology, by rotation. For the year 2005 the science prize was given in physics. This year’s awards bring the total number of laureates to 161 distinguished individuals from 37 countries. 36 Scientists from 9 countries have won the KFIP for Science. Within two decades the KFIP are ranked among the most prestigious awards. Several of the KFIP Laureates in Science and Medicine have gone on to receive the Nobel Prize. The Prizes are awarded during a ceremony in Riyadh, under the auspices of the King of Saudi Arabia.
    Federico Capasso is the Robert L. Wallace Professor of Applied Physics at Harvard University. Capasso received the doctor of physics degree, summa cum laude, from the University of Rome, Italy in 1973. After doing research infibreoptics at Foundazione Bordini in Rome, he joined BellLabs in 1976. He joined Harvard in 2003. The Award Committee describes Capasso as, “one of the most creative and influential physicists in the world having achieved international recognition through his design and demonstration of the Quantum Cascade Laser. This revolutionary approach, perhaps the most important development in laser physics during the last decade, signifies an imaginative breakthrough in this field enabling a remarkable contribution of excellent solid-state science and laser physics with new solid-state technology.” Frank Wilczek is the Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Wilczek received Ph.D. from Princeton University. He shared the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics with David J. Gross and H. David Politzer. Wilczek is recognized for “contributions to several arenas.” The citation further states, “ the most important of these has been the elucidation of Quantum Chromodynamics as the correct model for the Strong Force, one of the four known forces in nature. This masterpiece, alongside his other seminal achievements, elevates him to the ranks of the world’s most prominent scientists.”
    Professor Anton Zeilinger is at the University of Vienna and co-director of the Institute of Quantum Optics and Quantum Information of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. The Award Committee describes, “contributions ranging from epistemological and foundational research to the forefront of modern quantum technology, Zeilinger has served and advanced mankind in both the cultural and technological domains. His impressive body of work includes that of applying the laws of quantum mechanics for the teleportation of the properties of a particle, heralded as a scientific milestone. In addition to this, he has successfully idenified Quantum Cryptography as the only current method guaranteeing the confidentiality of a transmitted message as governed by natural laws.”
    The Prize for Service to Islam has been awarded jointly to Dr. Ahmed Mohamed Ali (Saudi Arabia) for his contributionsto Islamic Banking, and the Al-Hariri Foundation, a leading philanthropic institution in Lebanon. The Prize for Islamic Studies has been awarded to Carole Hillenbrand, a Professorof Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh, UK. The Prize for Arabic Language and Literature is with held this year as the nominations received were judged to be unqualified.
    The Prize for Medicine is awarded to Professors Sir Richard Doll and Sir Richard Peto of the Clinical Trial Service Unit at Oxford University, UK, for their pioneering and profoundly valuable epidemiologic research that has unequivocally established the link between tobacco and various diseases, such as vascular diseases and cancers, and has, in addition, served to propagate further research elucidating the molecular mechanisms of tobacco mediated cellular damage and DNA mutations. Indeed, so great has the impact of their studies been that several national health policies have been modified as a result of these findings. The World Health Organization itself changed its position on smoking, which culminated in a demonstrable decline in deaths related to cancer and atheroscle-rotic vascular diseases in several developed countries. Such significant benefits have transcended to large populations of developing countries as well, proffering an immeasurable contribution to mankind.

References
[1] King Faisal Foundation Website: http://www.kff.com/.
[2] Nobel Prizes Website: http://www.nobel.se/.
[3] Sameen Ahmed Khan, King Faisal Palace to become auniversity, AAPPS Bulletin, 13 (2), pp. 34-35
     (April 2003).




Spanish Relativity Meeting: A Century of Relativity Physics
September 6-10, 2005
Oviedo, Spain


    Dear Colleagues, We would like to remind you that the deadline for submitting abstracts to the XVIII Spanish Relativity Meeting “A Century of Relativity Physics,” 6-10 Sept. 2005, Oviedo, Spain, is approaching. This deadline has been slightly extended: Deadline for abstract submission: June 15. Deadline for registration: July 15.
    There are now 15 plenary speakers:
• E. Alvarez, UAM, Madrid, Spain.
• L. Alvarez-Gaume, CERN, Geneva, Switzerland.
• S. Bonazzola, LUTH, Paris, France.
• B. Carter, LUTH, Paris, France.
• T. Damour, IHES, Paris, France.
• J. Ehlers, AEI-MPG, Postdam, Germany.
• R. Hakim, LUTH, Paris, France.
• J. Ma. Ibanez, DAA, Valencia, Spain.
• J. P. Luminet, LUTH, Paris, France.
• M. McCallum, Queen Mary U., London, UK.
• T. Ortin, IFT-UAM, Madrid, Spain.
• J. Silk, Oxford Astrophysics, UK.
• R. A. Sunyaev, MPA Garching, Germany and Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow.
• T. Thiemann, AEI-MPG, Postdam, Germany and PITP, Waterloo, Canada.
• D. Wands, U. Portsmouth, UK.
    The Meeting intends to cover all aspects of relativity physics: foundations of relativity, relativistic astrophysics, gravita-tionalwaves, numerical relativity, observational tests, cosmology, exact solutions of Einstein equations, Kerr metric and blackholes, strings, M-Theory, quantum gravity, relativistic continuous media, relativistic nuclear physics and particle physics, historical and physical perspective, etc.
    More information can be obtained by visiting our webpage http://fisi24.ciencias.uniovi.es/ere05.html, E-mail: ere05@fisi24.ciencias.uniovi.es.

Yours sincerely,
the Local Organizing Committee:
J. Diaz-Alonso, M. Lorente, Y. Lozano,
L. Mornas, A. Nieto, M. A. R. Osorio,
L. Toffolatti

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

• Errata for “Impacts of Einstein’s Visit on Physics in Japan” by Professor Hiroshi Ezawa, AAPPS Bulletin,
  Vol. 15, No. 2, April 2005.
 

Page	Column	Line	to be corrected	after correction
4	Fig. 1	7th	(A. Kuwaki) 1917-1919	1907-1909
4	Fig. 1	8th	(K. Aichi) 1918-1919	1908-1909
9	Table 2	1th	Rel. of rel.	Theor. of Rel.
12	Right	10	Yasuda	Hoda
13	Caption for Fig. 10		Cockdroft	Cockcroft
14	Right	5th	Zäurich	Zürich
15	Right	19th from bottom	News	New
15	Right	11th from bottom	Tomonnaga	Tomonaga

• Apology for the lateness of two more articles in the Highlight of the Issue, “Eienstein’s Visit in Asia.”