World prodigies are marvels. They seem to come from the Mars. And they possess extra-ordinary brains. And they perform unusual skills that ordinary folks sneer at. Yet, they are a generation apart from other people in Intelligent Quotient (IQ). And rare in number. Like comet, their works announce them and their larger-than-life image is not hidden.
For example, Akrit Jaswal walked and talked by the time he was 10 months old. By two years, he had started reading and writing. He read Shakespeare in English by the time he was five. Akrit has an I.Q. of 146, the highest I.Q. of any boy of his age in India.
Think Change India published on March 15, 2016 that Akrit became the world’s youngest surgeon at the age of seven. As a medical genius, he successfully operated on an eight-year-old girl-a burn patient. The burn fused her fingers together, but Akrit performed the surgery and freed her fingers.
Akrit was sponsored and mentored by Mr B. R. Rahi the Chairman of Secondary Education in Dharamshala. At 12, Akrit was studying for a science degree at Chandigarh College. He is the youngest student ever accepted by an Indian University, reports AcchiKhabre.
Akrit’s keenness to find a cure for cancer brought him worldwide attention and admiration. The ‘Firecracker Films’ that investigated the story about Akrit invited him to London and meet leading medical researchers. They also asked ‘Team Focus’, an organization to assess the intelligence of the 12-year-old boy.
The team said that Akrit was exceptional in verbal and numeracy tests, but his practical tests were poor, especially in pattern matching. This youngster from India featured on the Oprah Show as “the little genius”. Akrit is indeed an exceptional medical marvel, who is focused on finding a cure for cancer. Currently he’s studying Bioengineering at IIT Kanpur.
Alia Sabur is also a prodigy who made headlines in 2009. At 10, she was the youngest student to attend college and four years later, she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Mathematics from Stony Brook University.
By 18, she had obtained a doctorate degree in Materials Science and Engineering.
Alia Sabur has set a new Guinness World Record as the youngest college professor in history. She broke the nearly 300-year old record set in 1717 by Colin Maclaurin, a Scottish mathematician and student of Isaac Newton, who became a professor at 19.
“Getting the Guinness World Record was really a great honor to be in such a distinguish company as the former record holder who was Newton’s prodigy and a very, very successful mathematician in every calculus book there is,” she says. “So I’m hoping to continue the tradition and do the best I can.”
Sabur was 18 when she was employed by Konkuk University in Seoul, South Korea in the Department of Advanced Technology Fusion. She says teaching students who are older than she is will not be an issue for her.
“My classmates have always been older than me,” she says. “My colleagues have always been older than me. I’m kind of used to it by now. Usually, once people realize that I really do know what I’m doing, there is not usually a problem.”
Last semester, Sabur taught four courses in Mathematics and Physics at Southern University in New Orleans.
“I really enjoy teaching,” she says. “It’s fulfilling. I learned a lot in my experience at Southern University in New Orleans, which is historically a black college, and the only university in New Orleans that’s still operating out of trailers. I wanted to help their recovery effort.”
In her new position on the Konkuk campus, Sabur will also be a research liaison with her alma mater – Stony Brook University in New York.
“The research that I’m working on is in nano technology,” she says. “It involves developing nanotube based cellular probes for medical research and studying cures and effective treatments for all kinds of diseases.”
Through her work – whether it’s researching, teaching or public speaking – Sabur hopes to dispel the myth that girls are not as good as boys are at math and science.
“I’m hoping to be a role model for other girls,” she says, “and inspire them to go into those subjects so that they can prove the same thing, that girls are good at math and science and that you don’t have to be really nerdy or weird to be successful in them.”
Alia Sabur credits her family for her success.
“We tried to encourage her as much as possible to do whatever it was that she was interested in,” Sabur’s mother, Julie, says. “We let her explore her interests not ours.”
Julie Sabur and her husband, Mark, were able to recognize their only child’s uniqueness when she was just a baby. Alia started to talk and read at 8 months, she says, adding that her daughter has always had an unusual ability for comprehension and processing information. She went from elementary school to college at age 10, skipping 8 years of basic education.
And her talent is not limited to academics. The same year, she entered college, and began studying the clarinet at the Juilliard School of Music. By 11, she had made her solo debut with an orchestra.
“She has been very respectful toward her elders. She’s always appreciated great master musicians who she has been fortunate enough to study under. I think maybe she was a little intimidated by the fact they were so accomplished, but usually the music and the science go beyond the age.”
Alia Sabur says she is excited about living in South Korea, a country she has never been to before. She hopes she will inspire more girls there to study science, and also encourage more international collaboration among universities and their students.
But, Yasha Asley shattered the age record of Alia Sabur. At 14, Asley was declared the world’s youngest professor with an incredible knowledge in Mathematics. Known as the human calculator, he is teaching at the University of Leicester while pursuing his own degree.
While most children of his age attend school and play in their free time, this young boy of Iranian descent is enriching young minds.
Yasha’s father, Moussa Asley, drops him at the university every day. He expresses how proud he is of his son, who has always had an interest in mathematics. Realising his son’s immense knowledge and potential, he approached the university.
Only 13 at the time, Yasha was contacted by the university, where the panel reviewing him was shocked at the extent of his knowledge. He was then appointed a professor at the university. His father now finds immense satisfaction in seeing his 14-year-old son teaching kids older than himself.
Yasha, who wishes to complete his degree and then pursue his Ph.D, says that the first time he met the panel, they asked him a variety of questions. When he answered all of them, they realised what an asset to the institution he could be.
Joining as a guest professor at the university at such a young age, he had to seek various permissions from the HRD department. Even when the permission letter was presented to the university’s council, they found it extremely hard to believe. However, once the council authorities met Yasha, they understood the contribution he could make to their university.
Yasha says that more than getting a job, it is contributing to the expansion of his students’ knowledge that gives him satisfaction.
The list of world prodigies is inexhaustible. Send yours to us for publication.
