KUALA LUMPUR, March 1 — Dr Harith Ahmad is a man of science who believes that the lack of racial harmony in this country is why there is so little innovation.

He believes that big corporations who can contribute so much to the field of science are still operating within racial silos.

Born in Alor Setar, Dr Harith made his way to Universiti Malaya where he obtained a first-class Bachelor’s degree in Physics, as well as a Master’s in High Voltage Technology, before going to the University of Wales to obtain a Doctorate in Laser Technology.

In addition to academia, Harith is an inventor, and holds 10 patents jointly with Telekom Malaysia.

He was recently named Distinguished Professor for 2014, the latest in a series of awards he’s received including the Asean Science and Technology Award and the Merdeka Award for his contributions to science.

At 60, he continues to teach and research in the Department of Physics at Universiti Malaya, where he focuses on photonics, the science of generating and manipulating light. His research includes the fabrication of semiconductor-pumped solid-state lasers and developing techniques to study laser shadowgraphy. Yup, we don’t know what that means either, so we’ll let him explain. In his own words: