Moti Lal Rustgi

Professor of Physics at UB 1966-1992

Professor Rustgi was born in Delhi, India. He received his B. Sc. and M. Sc. degrees from Delhi University in 1949 and 1951, respectively. He obtained his Ph.D. in physics at Louisiana State University in 1957, working with Joseph S. Levinger; after which he went on to postdoctoral positions at Yale University; the National Research Council in Ottawa, Canada; and Harvard University. He returned to India in 1961 and served as a Reader in Physics at Banaras Hindu University until early 1963, at which time he returned to the United States to take up a position as assistant professor of physics at the University of Southern California. After one year there, he became an assistant professor at Yale University, where he worked extensively with Professor Gregory Breit. He joined the University at Buffalo as an associate professor in 1966, and was promoted to full professor in 1968.

Professor Rustgi worked in nuclear physics, atomic physics, medical physics and condensed matter physics. The bulk of his work was in atomic and nuclear physics. He worked on electromagnetic interactions with nuclei, the nucleon-nucleon interaction, parity violation in nuclei, the structure of nuclei, as well as the scattering of high energy particles from nuclei. His favorite topic was undoubtedly the photodisintegration of the deuteron, a subject he returned to again and again and on which he was considered an expert. In atomic physics he worked on relativistic radiative transitions, atomic form factors, atomic ionization and the stopping power of matter at high energies.

In the last decade of his life his interests broadened into other areas. He examined the absorption of RF and microwave radiation in biological systems, and carried out Monte Carlo calculations for the electron spectrum produced by photons in materials of interest to health physicists. He also became involved in studies of quantum well structures of interest to semiconductor physicists.

Professor Rustgi was a Fellow of the American Physical Society. He served as a visiting professor at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, a visiting scientist at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, as well as a faculty research participant at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C.

Professor Rustgi was an outstanding citizen of the University at Buffalo. He had that all too rare ability to make significant contributions to all aspects of university life. Besides being an outstanding researcher, he was highly regarded as a teacher, and gave freely of his time in service to the university.

Professor Rustgi, passed away on November 16, 1992. He was 63 years old.

  • Professor Rustgi's Papers

    • Rustgi Lectures