The Department of Physics at the University of Karachi hosted the two-day Frontiers of Physics National Symposium on Modern Trends in Physics Research, jointly organised by the Karachi Physics Society and Pakistan Physical Society, providing a platform for researchers and academics to exchange ideas across multiple advanced branches of the discipline including high-energy physics, computational physics, condensed matter physics, plasma physics, biomedical physics, and energy and environment research. The symposium’s scope reflected the extent to which physics has evolved from a foundational science into a discipline whose methods and discoveries now underpin technologies ranging from medical diagnostics to artificial intelligence systems.
Department of Physics Chairman Professor Dr Intikhab Ulfat opened the symposium by framing science as fundamentally a process of questioning and discovery, noting that modern scientific instruments and technology have enabled researchers to observe and analyse phenomena that were once considered entirely inaccessible. He pointed to the detection of gravitational waves as a landmark illustration of how advances in instrumentation and signal processing have extended the reach of physics into phenomena occurring millions of light-years away, such as the collision of black holes, events whose effects can now be traced and measured with precision on Earth. His remarks underscored the extent to which progress in physics is inseparable from progress in the computational and technological infrastructure through which physical phenomena are detected, modelled, and interpreted.
The intersection of physics with artificial intelligence was addressed directly by speaker Dr Afzal, who argued that even in the era of rapidly advancing artificial intelligence, the foundational role of physics in scientific and technological progress remains undiminished. He pushed back against the notion that artificial intelligence would eventually supplant human scientific judgment entirely, maintaining that human consciousness, decision-making, and the capacity for original inquiry hold a unique significance that current artificial intelligence systems do not replicate. The comment is particularly relevant given the growing use of machine learning and deep learning methods within physics research itself, where artificial intelligence tools are increasingly deployed to analyse large datasets from particle accelerators, telescopes, and medical imaging systems in ways that would be computationally impractical through conventional methods. Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences Professor Dr Muhammad Haris Shoaib highlighted the practical applications dimension, noting that physics principles are directly utilised in pharmaceutical manufacturing processes including capillary systems, capsule filling, and compression, and that modern software and computational technology have opened new possibilities for research across the intersection of physics and pharmaceutical sciences.
Several speakers used the symposium to call for increased investment in physics education, research, and modern technology at Pakistan’s universities, with Professor Dr Muhammad Haris Shoaib noting that developed countries are making large-scale investments in physics and related modern technologies and that Pakistan must advance its own research and development capacity in these areas to participate meaningfully in global scientific progress. The symposium also served as a reminder that Pakistan has a functioning community of physics researchers working across disciplines that are directly relevant to the country’s technology and industrial development ambitions, and that platforms for intellectual exchange and collaborative research of this kind play a practical role in translating that community’s work into the kind of cumulative knowledge base on which applied technological progress depends.
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