Five Vietnamese scientists have been listed among the 100 most outstanding researchers in Asia this year by Singapore’s Asian Scientist magazine. 

The 100 in the list have made contributions to solving urgent global issues such as climate change and the Covid-19 pandemic or have made breakthroughs in their own fields.

Le Thi Quynh Mai of the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology Vietnam in Hanoi leads a team of women researchers who were awarded the 2019 Vietnamese Kovalevskaia Award for their successful isolation of a new strain of the novel coronavirus.

Her team has spent the last two decades fighting deadly diseases, most notably SARS, A/H5N1 bird flu and H1N1.

Tran Thi Thu Ha from Thai Nguyen University in the northern province of the same name also won the 2019 Vietnamese Kovalevskaia Award for her research into the breeding and intensive cultivation of trees, the propagation and rearing of non-timber forest products and medicinal herbs and the development of medicinal plants.

Vuong Thi Ngoc Lan from the Ho Chi Minh City University of Medicine and Pharmacy was one of three recipients of the 2020 Ta Quang Buu Awards, an annual prize given by the Ministry of Science and Technology to encourage and honor scientists with outstanding achievements in basic research in the fields of natural sciences and engineering, for her research comparing the transfer of fresh and frozen embryos for in vitro fertilization.

Pham Tien Son of Da Lat University was also a recipient of the 2020 Ta Quang Buu Awards for his studies into generic properties for semi-algebraic programs.

Nguyen Truong Thanh Hieu of HCMC’s Ton Duc Thang University was yet another recipient of the 2020 Ta Quang Buu Awards for his studies into determining electron inelastic mean free paths in materials. The inelastic mean free path (IMFP) is an index of how far an electron on average travels through a solid before losing energy.

(From top L to bottom R) Scientists Tran Thi Thu Ha, Vuong Thi Ngoc Lan,
Le Thi Quynh Mai, Pham Tien Son and Nguyen Truong Thanh Hieu.
Photos courtesy of Asian Scientist.

Every year since 2016 the Asian Scientist Magazine has been compiling a list of the continent’s most outstanding researchers to celebrate the success of the region’s best and brightest, highlighting their achievements across a range of scientific disciplines.

To make the list, scientists must have received a national or international prize in the preceding year for their research, made a significant scientific discovery or provided leadership in academia or industry.

Asian Scientist is published by a team of professional science and medical journalists with contributions from industry and academia.