Could the next Einstein come from Africa?

Could the next Einstein come from Africa?

FrancisAlloteyCNN African Voices, sponsored by Nigeria’s telecommunications company, Glo, will this month shift focus from comedy to science as Ghana’s most famous mathematical scientist took centre stage on the show.

The 30-minute magazine programme brought  to television viewers the man behind ‘the Allotey Formalism Theory’ – Professor Francis Kofi Ampenyin Allotey from Ghana.

African Voices which airs on CNN International .

For his inspirational role in the promotion of physics in Africa, in particular for his role in establishing the African Physical Society.

Allotey has been a key leader in the promotion of physics both within Ghana and more widely across Africa.

In 2012 he was awarded the prestigious Honorary Fellowship Award of the Institute of Physics (IOP), London.

Other winners of this award in the past include Professor Stephen Hawking, the world renowned theoretical physicist, who is regarded as one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Einstein.

Professor Stephen Hawking , Since 1979  has held the post of Lucasian Professor at Cambridge University, the same position held in 1663 by Isaac Newton, who has been considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived.

Born in 1932 in Saltpond, Prof. Allotey has for decades been a phenomenal inspirer and influence in the study of Physics and Mathematics in Ghanaian schools, colleges and universities.

He was the first to introduce computer education in Ghana and is the Founder and First Director of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) Computer Centre.

He became a living legend and world authority when he developed the “Allotey Formalism” for which he received the Prince Philip Gold Medal Award in 1973. The theory arose from his work on soft X-ray spectroscopy and attempts to explain what happens when an atom is bombarded by external particles and is most relevant for space research.

A founding fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, the scientist in 1974 became the first Ghanaian full professor of mathematics and head of the Department of Mathematics at KNUST.?

Allotey is the President of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of a number of international scientific organizations including the International Institute of Theoretical and Applied Physics (ICTP) Scientific Council since 1996.

He is the Chairman of Board of Trustees of the Accra Institute of Technology (AIT), the President of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, Ghana (AIMS-Ghana) and the President of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences (GAAS).

 

He believes the next Einstein should come from Africa and is working to inspire the next generation of African scientists.

Categories: Africa, Community News

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