Mansouri obtained his PhD in physics and astronomy at the University of Vienna in 1972. He is professor of physics at Sharif University of Technology in Tehran. His previous positions include: chairman of the department of physics at Sharif University of Technology from 1983-85 and from 1991-93; and president of the Physics Society of Iran (1984-88, 1992-95 and 1999-2006). He is well known for his test theory of relativity which he developed in the 1970s with Roman Sexl at the University of Vienna. His theory constitutes a theoretical framework for testing the theories claiming to be an alternative to Einstein's theory of relativity. He has been awarded the Abdus Salam Prize for Iranian Scientists in 1989. He is a fellow of the Academy of Science, and associate fellow of the Academy for Irainian Litrature and Farsi Language Iran. He has been founding director of the Iranian National Observatory from 2007-20018. He has also served as deputy for research at the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology of Iran from 2001-2004. His social activities related to sustainable deveplemt in Iran is reflected in his collected works including seven titles published in 2022.

Murthy is INSA senior professor in the Molecular Biophysics Unit, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore. He obtained his bachelor's from Bangalore University (1970), master's from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (1972) and PhD from the IISc, Bangalore (1977). His research interests are X-ray crystallography, protein and virus structure. He has been awarded the Shantiswaroop Bhatnagar Prize, Rustum Choksi award, GN Ramachandran commemoration award, Hari Om Ashram Trust Award, Jagdish Chandra Bose Award for Life Sciences and G.N. Ramachandram gold medal for excellence in biological sciences. He has been elected to the Indian Academy of Sciences, Indian National Science Academy, and the National Academy of Sciences, India.