About BCVSPIN

BCVSPIN (an acronym denoting Bangladesh, China, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, India and Nepal) program was initiated in 1989 by Professors Abdus Salam, Jogesh Pati, Yu Lu, and Qaisar Shafi with the goal of providing a platform for scientists in the South/Southeast Asia region to learn about exciting developments in particle/astroparticle physics and cosmology from leading experts. Previous editions, traditionally funded by ICTP, took place in Nepal (1989, 1990, 1994-97), India (1992), China (2007, 2009, 2013), Vietnam (2011), and Mexico (2014). The most recent edition was organized as a virtual program in 2021 and was attended by more than 300 participants.

Future Plans

In the past decade, countries in this region have shown great interest and initiative in developing research programs in high-energy physics. China and India are involved in several leading experiments; Pakistan (2015) and India (2017) are now associate members of CERN; Bangladesh, Nepal, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka have also recently signed International Co-operation Agreements with CERN. In this context, regional in-person events such as BCVSPIN are crucial to sustain this development and enthusiasm at the grassroots level, bring the scientific communities in these countries together and offer networking opportunities. Moreover, it provides world-class training to groom the current generation of graduate students and young scientists to ensure the long-term development of high-energy physics programs in the region. The proposed BCVSPIN initiative is part of a larger effort to make this regional event a regular fixture in the future, and it has already received broad enthusiastic endorsement from the local and international physics community.