Born and raised in Bangladesh, Dr. Maqsudul Alam is now a professor at the Department of Microbiology, University of Hawaii at Maui. Previously he was a visiting scientist at Washington State University, senior research scientist at Russia's Academy of Sciences and Humboldt Research Fellow at the Max-Planck Institute in Germany. In February 2000, Dr. Alam along with another scientist has discovered a new class of proteins that may help trace when and where life began on Earth -- and if it exists elsewhere in the universe.
Charles Hayes, dean of the College of Natural Sciences at the University of Hawaii, said a campus wide Center of Genomics, Proteomics and Bioinformatics Research is being planned to take advantage of UH's location and expertise in that area. He said UH is fortunate to have Alam, among those involved in planning the center, because many people are interested in him across the United States. "But one of his main reasons for staying in Hawaii is his love of the people here.
"He's seen their lives change for having been involved with what he's doing, from students in the classroom to high school students he's brought in to work in the lab, to postdoctoral people whose lives have been changed by the opportunity to work in this endeavor."
Alam's father is a martyr of 1971 Bangladesh War of Independence. A former student of Government Laboratory High School at Dhaka, Alam is an avid fan of nature photography and Bangladeshi foods. He shuttles back and forth between Honolulu, where he teaches at the University and run his research lab and Maui every week, where he is the principal investigator of Computational Proteomic Program at Maui High Performance Computing Center. His only daughter, Liliana Alam, now studies in New Zealand.
