By ABWire
Dr. Neelam Gupta, a longtime physicist with the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, died Sept. 11 at her home in Bethesda, Md. She was 77.
She is survived by her husband, Dr. Dattakumar (Prakash) Madhusudan Chitre, and daughters, Sonali Priyamvada Chitre and Dr. Geetali Priyanka Chitre.
Funeral services are scheduled for 9 a.m. Wednesday, Sept. 17, at Pumphrey Funeral Home in downtown Bethesda.
Dr. Gupta was born Nov. 12, 1947, in Narsingpur, Madhya Pradesh, India, to Biharilal Gupta, a superintendent of schools, and Sitadevi Gupta. She was one of seven children: Camala (deceased), Vimala (deceased), Santosh, Muni (deceased), Shakun, and Shekar (deceased).
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An exceptional student, she ranked 10th in the state on her high school board examinations, excelling in Hindi, Sanskrit, mathematics, and physics. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Sagar University, where she received a gold medal for academic achievement, and later completed a master’s degree in physics at Benares Hindu University.
Dr. Gupta came to the United States in 1970 to pursue a Ph.D. in physics at the University of Maryland, College Park. There, she met Prakash, a fellow student in the department. The two married on Feb. 20, 1973, in Salt Lake City, Utah.
For 41 years, Dr. Gupta worked as a research physicist at the Army Research Laboratory in Adelphi, Md., securing numerous patents and publishing more than 100 scientific papers. Outside of work, she enjoyed reading fiction and biographies, exercising, fashion design, and traveling the world.