LAHORE: (Tuesday, November 5, 2019): Punjab University Vice Chancellor Prof Niaz Ahmad Akhtar has said that there was need to remove missing connection between subjects of science and engineering from our universities to address challenges being faced by the country in science and technology. He was addressing an international symposium “Advanced Energy Storage Materials” organized by Punjab University Department of Physics at Al Raazi Hall. On this occasion Dean Faculty of Science Dr Muhammad Sharif, Dr Tim Patrick Fellinger from Germany, Chairman Department of Physics Prof Dr Mahmood Ul Hassan, faculty members, research scholars and a large number of students were present.

Addressing the inaugural session, Prof Niaz Ahmad said that PU would establish Centre for Advanced Materials to remove gap between science and engineering. He said that nobody could work in isolation and we must prepare to cope with the challenges being faced by the world. He said that nano-materials had reduced the size of materials manifold. He said that such conferences were indicators of the volume of research and provided an opportunity to network researchers in their relevant fields and interact with each other. He said that students must see what was being done in their fields at advanced level. Dr Mahmood ul Hassan said that the symposia had been organized on advances in various topics of theoretical and applied physics. He said that it would also cover topics on electrode materials for batteries and supercapacitors and focus on the computational materials for energy storage. He said that the symposium had served as platform for students to exchange knowledge and experiences with each other. Addressing the conference, Dr Fellinger said that there was no doubt that the humanity was benefiting from various materials however the materials were contaminating environment too. He said that Pakistan had abundance of sunlight and there was need to have good storage devices to capture solar energy in Pakistan. He said that we wanted generate energy through cheap means without risking environment of our planet. Later, souvenirs were distributed among distinguished guests.