Muhammad Sahimi

"Mohammad Sahimi" redirects here. For footballer, see Mohammad Sahimi (footballer).

Muhammad Sahimi (Persian: محمد سهیمی; born 22 January 1954) is a Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science and holds the NIOC (National Iranian Oil Company) Chair in petroleum engineering at the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles.[1] He is also active in journalism, frequently writing on Iranian politics.

Career

Sahimi received his B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Tehran in 1977. After briefly working for the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), he received a scholarship from the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. He traveled to the US in 1978[2] (where he has since remained), completing his Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota in 1984. He then moved to the University of Southern California, becoming Chairman of his department from 1999 to 2005. Since then, he has held the NIOC Chair. He has also been a visiting professor in Australia and a consultant to many industrial corporations.[3]

He was named a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2023, "for fundamental contributions to the development of percolation theory and statistical physics, specifically in the characterization of heterogeneous porous materials and media, as well as the study of flow and transport processes occurring therein".[4]

Political views

Sahimi writes in broad support of Iranian reformists, one of the two main political camps inside the Islamic Republic regime; the other one is Iranian Conservatives.[5] Since 2003, Sahimi has written many articles on the subject of Iranian politics (particularly the Iranian nuclear programme) for websites such as Payvand, Antiwar.com[6] and the Huffington Post.[7] He has been a regular columnist for Tehran Bureau since 2008,[8] and has written occasional pieces for the Los Angeles Times,[9] the New York Times,[10] the Wall Street Journal[11] the Harvard International Review[12] and The Progressive.[13]

He has, on many occasions, defended Iran's nuclear program as being peaceful, and the actions of Iran as being essentially legal and justifiable (originally in a seven-part series at Payvand entitled Iran's Nuclear Program).[14][15][16][17][18][19][20] In the process, he has frequently leveled criticism against other writers on the subject, accusing Con Coughlin (of the UK Daily Telegraph) of knowingly spreading lies and disinformation,[21] and David Albright of exceptional bias.[22] (Albright responded to the criticism in a program on antiwar.com radio).[citation needed] He has also criticized two former Deputy Directors-General of the IAEA, Olli Heinonen and Pierre Goldschmidt, citing unnamed sources to accuse Heinonen of breaking the IAEA protocols by leaking confidential information (to David Albright) and of spreading unconfirmed claims about the contents of a laptop that was supposedly stolen from Iran and given to Western intelligence agencies, as part of a "crusade against Iran."[22] He also accused Goldschmidt of having a "personal agenda"[23] about Iran's nuclear program, while also disputing his assessment that Iran has violated the NPT.

In his writings on Iran's nuclear program, Sahimi has also expressed the view that the United Nation's Security Council sanction resolutions against Iran are illegal.[24] Because of his strong support for the Islamic Republic of Iran's nuclear program and the similarity of his arguments to those used by the Iranian government in its IAEA submissions,[25] he has been accused of being close to the government in Tehran. Sahimi has denied these accusations but has stated that his articles have been used without his knowledge by members of the Iranian political establishment, including Ayatollah Rafsanjani.[26]

Books

  1. Applications of Percolation Theory (1994)[27]
  2. Flow and Transport in Porous Media and Fractured Rock (1995); second edition (2011).[28]
  3. Heterogeneous Materials I, Linear Transport, and Optical Properties (2003)[29]
  4. Heterogeneous Materials II, Nonlinear and Breakdown Properties and Atomistic Modeling (2003)[30]

Notes

  1. ^ "Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science: Muhammad Sahimi". Chems.usc.edu. Archived from the original on 1 November 2011. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  2. ^ "Iran Coverage Experts: No Evidence of Iranian Nuclear Weapons Program |". Irancoverage.com. 5 November 2007. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  3. ^ "Muhammad Sahimi CV" (PDF). USC Viterbi School of Engineering. Retrieved 26 December 2017.
  4. ^ "2023 Fellows". APS Fellow Archive. American Physical Society. Retrieved 19 October 2023.
  5. ^ "Reformists on the Rise". Tehran Bureau / FRONTLINE. PBS. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  6. ^ "Muhammad Sahimi". Original.antiwar.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  7. ^ "Muhammad Sahimi". HuffPost. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  8. ^ "Spotlight: Muhammad Sahimi – Tehran Bureau | FRONTLINE". PBS. 1 March 2010. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  9. ^ Sahimi, Muhammad (22 June 2007). "Iranian American is twice victimized". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  10. ^ Sahimi, Muhammad (28 April 2009). "Op-Ed – Iran's Power Struggle". The New York Times. Iran. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  11. ^ http://viterbi.usc.edu/assets/022/12892.pdf [bare URL PDF]
  12. ^ "Forced to Fuel – Iran's Nuclear Energy Program". Harvard International Review. 6 May 2006. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  13. ^ ""Leave Us Alone," Iranian Reformers Say". The Progressive. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  14. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Program. Part I: Its History". Payvand.com. Archived from the original on 14 May 2019. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  15. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Program. Part II: Are Nuclear Reactors Necessary?". Payvand.com. 14 August 2003. Archived from the original on 18 July 2006. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  16. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Program. Part III: The Emerging Crisis". Payvand.com. 12 September 2003. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  17. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part IV: Economic Analysis of the Program". Payvand.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  18. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part V: From the United States Offering Iran Uranium Enrichment Technology to Suggestions for Creating Catastrophic Industrial Failure". Payvand.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  19. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program, Part VI: The European Union's Proposal, Iran's Defiance, and the Emerging Crisis". Payvand.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  20. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part VII: Are Referral of Iran's Nuclear Dossier to the Security Council and Resolutions 1696, 1737, and 1747 Legal?". Payvand.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  21. ^ Muhammad Sahimi (18 February 2009). "Who's Telling the Truth About Iran's Nuclear Program?". Antiwar.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  22. ^ a b Muhammad Sahimi (18 March 2009). "A New Judith Miller for Iran Hawks?". Antiwar.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  23. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part VII: Are Referral of Iran's Nuclear Dossier to the Security Council and Resolutions 1696, 1737, and 1747 Legal?". Payvand.com. 12 May 2007. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  24. ^ "Iran's Nuclear Energy Program. Part VII: Are Referral of Iran's Nuclear Dossier to the Security Council and Resolutions 1696, 1737, and 1747 Legal?". Payvand.com. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  25. ^ e.g., "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 11 September 2010. Retrieved 20 September 2009.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  26. ^ "The Drumbeats of War with Iran Are Getting Louder". Tehran Bureau / FRONTLINE. PBS. 8 August 2010. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
  27. ^ Zallen, Richard (27 January 1994). Applications of Percolation Theory (9780748400768): M Sahini, M Sahimi: Books. ISBN 0748400761.
  28. ^ Zoback, Mark D. (22 February 1995). Flow and Transport in Porous Media and Fractured Rock: From Classical Methods to Modern Approaches (9783527292608): Muhammad Sahimi: Books. ISBN 3527292608.
  29. ^ Dauxois, Thierry (15 May 2003). Heterogeneous Materials I: Linear Transport and Optical Properties (Interdisciplinary Applied Mathematics) (v. 1) (9780387001678): Muhammad Sahimi: Books. ISBN 0387001670.
  30. ^ "Heterogeneous Materials II: Nonlinear and Breakdown Properties and Atomistic Modeling: v. two eBook: Muhammad Sahimi: Kindle Store". Amazon. Retrieved 21 October 2011.