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Dr. Ashot Chilingarian Head of the Cosmic Ray Division (CRD) Alikhanyan Physics Institute Yerevan ARMENIA e-mail: chili {at} aragats.am IHY-Armenia Home Page

IHY Roles:

Brief Biography:

Ashot Chilingarian earned his Ph.D. in Physics and Mathematics in 1991 from Yerevan Physics Institute. From 1975, he has been a lecturer at Yerevan State University in Physics and Software Engineering. From 1971 to 1993 he was a scientist, then senior scientist at the Yerevan Physics Institute. In 1993 he became the deputy director of the Institute as well as head of the Cosmic Ray Division.

Currently, in addition to his duties in Armenia, he collaborates with many international centers for high energy physics and astrophysics research, including SLAC (Stanford Linear Accelerator Center), Japan's Nagoya University, and the Max Plank Institute for Physics and the Research Center Karlsruhe, both in Germany.

His expertise is in the sphere of high energy astroparticle physics, particle detector detectors instrumentation and advanced statistical computations, including Bayesian and neural network models. His current interests include the Galactic and Solar cosmic ray origin and acceleration, detection of secondary cosmic ray fluxes on earth surface, Space Weather, Atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes, and supernovae explosions.

Ashot Chilingarian has won about 20 research grants from foundations such as the International Science and Technology Center (ISTC), NATO, International Technology and Science foundation (INTAS) and the Civilian Research and Development Fund (CRDF). He is the author of the ANI (Analysis and Nonparametric Inference) computer code library, which has been extensively used during the last few decades for multidimensional analysis of data from modern cosmic ray installations. He also introduced the "multidimensional nonlinear cuts" method for analyzing data from the Air Cherenkov Telescope and event-by-event analysis methodology for Extensive Air Shower experiments. Under his supervision, the Data Visualization Interactive Network (DVIN) was developed for the Aragats Space Environmental Center. This project won a UN World Summit on Information Society award in Geneva in 2003.

Ashot Chilingarian recently proposed using the large ground-based detectors on Mt. Aragats, together with his statistical data analysis methods, for the advance detection of fluxes of charged and neutral particles to detect highest energy solar cosmic rays and research radiation and geomagnetic storms from severe solar energetic explosions. Preliminary research on recent violent solar eruptions indicates that the CRD research stations on Mt. Aragats are ideally located for this purpose.

Ashot Chilingarian is the founder of the Aragats Space Environment Center (ASEC), which is equipped with new hybrid particle detectors that simultaneously measure charged and neutral fluxes in secondary cosmic rays. He is also the author of a proposed world-wide network of new particle detectors for research in space weather and solar physics named SEVAN (Space Environment Viewing and Analysis Network).

Outside his field, Ashot Chilingarian has been interested in applying his data analysis methods to solutions for practical problems in industry and microbiology. He was awarded a research grant from the Civilian Research and Development Foundation (CRDF) to develop new methods of DNA micro-array data analysis based on quantification of different types of gene expression in normal and tumor-affected tissues. The work culminated in a patent application by Utah's Huntsman Cancer Research Center, with 75% authorship rights to Professor Chilingarian.

Ashot Chilingarian has authored approximately 250 publications and served on many international scientific boards. He has been chairperson of several international conferences and given numerous presentations in the fields of high energy and cosmic ray physics and on new methods of data analysis.

Currently Professor Chilingarian is Armenia's representative to COSPAR (the COmmission for SPace Research) and International Heliophysical Year 2007, spokesperson for ANI and ASEC collaborations, and a member of KASCADE and MAGIC (both international collaborations). In addition, he is on the board of the Armenian National Foundation of Science and Advanced Technologies (NFSAT).