GOPIO to honor achievers at annual banquet

NEW YORK: When GOPIO-Connecticut celebrates its third anniversary at the Italian Center of Stamford, two Indian Americans and the Mayor of Stamford will be honored by the organization for their outstanding achievements and contributions at an awards banquet on Apr 26.

The awardees are Dr Priyamvada Natarajan, Associate Professor at Yale University for her accomplishments and contributions to astro-physics; Dr Ajay Kapur, Director of Music Technology at California Institute of the Arts for his accomplishment as "Young Person of the Year" and  Mayor Dan Malloy of Stamford who will be inducted by the organization as "Friend of GOPIO".

GOPIO-CT (Global Organization of People of Indian Origin - Connecticut Chapter) serves as a non-partisan, secular, civic and community service organization. It promotes awareness of Indian culture, customs and contributions of PIOs through community programs, forums, events and youth activities.

It seeks to strengthen partnerships and create an ongoing dialogue with local communities. GOPIO is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization.
Over the last three years, GOPIO-CT has become an active and dynamic organization hosting interactive sessions with policy makers and academicians, community events, youth mentoring and networking workshops, as well as health awareness workshops. Sangeeta Ahuja the chapter's president said, "We at GOPIO-CT salute the awardees of 2009. They have enriched our lives and the community we live in with their dedication, contributions and the passion for what they do and have accomplished."

GOPIO International Chairman Dr Thomas Abraham said that GOPIO-CT has become one of the most active chapters in the GOPIO family. "By honoring those who have excelled in various fields, it has been providing great exposure of such role models to the next generation and it also motivates them to further excel themselves," Thomas added.
Dr Natarajan's recent discovery with a collaborator of the existence of an upper mass limit for black holes in the Universe has opened up new ways to constrain the mass growth history of black holes and has important consequences for galaxy formation.

While dark matter constitutes about 90% of the matter content of the Universe, its intrinsic properties as well as its coupling to ordinary atoms or baryons is poorly understood at present. A key focus of her work has been the detailed mapping of the spatial distribution of dark matter in cosmic structures with a view to obtaining constraints on the very nature of dark matter.

She was awarded the Radcliffe fellowship for 2008-09 and during this year she is hoping to investigate the current challenging and unsolved problem in cosmology - that of dark energy. During the year 2009-10, she plans to tackle a challenging problem in black hole physics - that of simulating the formation of the first black holes in the Universe.

She plans to perform the first high resolution simulations of the formation of compact, massive self-gravitating hot and20cold disks in metal-free halos in the early Universe, where the seeds are assembled. Mayor Dan Malloy was elected to his fourth term as Mayor of Stamford, Connecticut in 2005. He is the longest serving mayor in the history of Stamford. 

While juggling two academic positions, Dr Kapur also finds time to lead his Multimedia Consulting Company, KarmetiK, designing custom technology solutions for the entertainment industry. He received an Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in 2007 from University of Victoria combining Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Music and Psychology with a focus on Intelligent Music and Media Technology. Ajay graduated with a Bachelor in Science and Engineering Computer Science degree from Princeton University in 2002.

While growing up in New Canaan, CT, Ajay was always a musician at heart.  His work revolves around one question: "How do you make a computer improvise with a human?" Using the rules set forth by Indian classical tradition, Ajay has strived to build new interfaces for musical expression by modifying the tabla, dholak and sitar with added micro chips and sensor systems, while building robotic musical instruments which can be programmed to perform along with the human performer.