Muhammad Masud Ahmad (Urdu: محمد مسعود احمد; ), best known as Masood Ahmad, (16 November 1943 – 29 December 2018) was a Pakistani theoretical physicist and ICTP laureate known for his work in dual resonance and Veneziano model, a strings sting mathematically described the fundamental forces and forms of matter in quantum state.
Having specialised in Quantum and Statistical physics, Ahmad assisted and took part in the development of atomic bomb project as a member of Theoretical Physics Group in the 1970s, and participated in the development of the atomic bomb programme.
A staunch supporter of nuclear power, Ahmad has led Pakistan's delegation in many international and national forums and conferences in the issues of peaceful use of nuclear energy. A student of Abdus Salam, Ahmad was one of the senior scientists, despite of his age, of Theoretical Physics Group – a physics group that was mandated to develop the designs of nuclear weapons.
Biography
Born and educated in Lahore, British India, Masud Ahmad attended Punjab University in 1960, and completed his BSc degree in Physics under the contemporary supervision of Riazuddin, followed by MSc degree in Mathematical physics from the same institution in 1966. Ahmad then travelled to United Kingdom and attended Imperial College London where he began his doctoral studies under Abdus Salam's physics group. In 1968, he did his DSc degree in Theoretical physics under Abdus Salam . His dissertation dealt with the theory of Chiral symmetry and algebraic representation in Veneziano model – an early theory of stings.
Masud Ahmad's lifelong friendship with Riazuddin was very important for Masud's scientific and philosophical development. It was Riazuddin who arranged summer stay with Ishfaq Ahmad in Islamabad for young Ahmad, thus orienting his science career in nuclear physics. Ahmad spent two years at Institute of Physics (IP) of Quaid-i-Azam University where he worked under Faheem Hussain's Theoretical Physics Group.
At IP, he published the theoretical work on Veneziano Model where he had used the Compton scattering to investigate Pions behaviour on the Veneziano Model. In 1970, along with Fayyazuddin, he carried out the work on construction of Veneziano representation for pion photoproduction amplitude, in which he predicted that, keeping the and the ρ trajectories, the zero-free parameter fits for the sum and the difference of the differential cross sections for unpolarised photons and the asymmetry function Σ(+) are obtained.
Prior to the discovery of Alfvén wave in hydromagnetics in 1969, Ahmad was engaged as a theoretical physicist, working in the fields of quantum, molecular, and nuclear physics. In 1970, on an advice of Abdus Salam, Ahmad went to Italy to join International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) to pursue his further doctoral studies. In 1971, he was joined by Riazuddin and Abdus Salam where he contributed with them in an emerging theory of Quantum electrodynamics.
Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission
After becoming an ICTP Associate, Ahmad was one of the young and senior scientists who were working in the ICTP. In January 1972, Abdus Salam called one of his eminent students from Italy to report to Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission's chairman Munir Ahmad Khan. Masud Ahmad, along with Riazuddin, temporarily working at the International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), Italy, returned to Pakistan to begin theoretical work on a fission explosive device. The scientists were posted at Quaid-e-Azam University and the Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology (PINSTECH) respectively. In the absence of the availability of computers, they use the mainframe computers at Quaid-e-Azam University for work related to the theoretical physics of a nuclear explosive device. He, along with Raziuddin Siddiqui and Riazuddin formed the Theoretical Physics Group (TPG) in PAEC, which was mandated to develop the theoretical designs of Pakistan's nuclear weapons.