Goettingen: The City that Creates Knowledge

In the recent Hollywood blockbuster, “Oppenheimer”, Niels Bohr urges the young Robert to visit Goettingen to get himself educated in modern theoretical physics. For one without such lofty ambitions, however, – such as a regular tourist – this apparently unremarkable central German town holds few attractions. On the other hand, for the scientifically-inclined minority, Goettingen possesses great treasures that originate from an unbelievably rich academic heritage. These cannot be fully savoured by cursory visits to museums and libraries: one need to spend days walking the leafy cobblestoned alleys and wait for Goettingen to gradually reveal its wealth. 

About the speaker:

Pushan Ayyub was a Senior Professor and Chair of the Department of Condensed Matter Physics at TIFR when he retired in 2019. His research interests concern the basic mechanisms that control the size dependence of physical properties such as superconductivity, ferroelectricity and magnetism in the nanometer regime. Prof. Ayyub completed his Ph.D. from TIFR in 1986 on the physics of nanomaterials and carried out post-doctoral studies at the University of Florida. He re-joined TIFR in 1990. He was a member of the International Committee on Nanostructured Materials during 1998-2008 and was in the Nanoscience Advisory Group of the Govt. of India (DST). He has won several awards, including the National Research Award in Nanoscience and Technology (2010). He is a Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy.