Open Access: a general concern

As reported in our previous e-EPS issue, the European Physical Society [EPS] has started a discussion and survey among the European scientific learned societies concerning Open Access.

Today the transition from the current subscription-based system for scientific journals (or from the frequently adopted hybrid author pays/subscription-based system) to full open access is a serious concern. Very recently a statement precisely on the transition to open access was published by Science Europe…

Giorgio Benedek appointed as new Editor-in-Chief of EPL

Professor Giorgio Benedek has been appointed as the new Editor-in-Chief of EPL, a journal publishing original, high-quality letters in all areas of physics.

Giorgio Benedek currently works at the Department of Materials Science, University of Milan. His research interests include materials science and the physics of low-dimensional systems. He gained his first degree and PhD from the University of Milan…

A historic view from Galilei’s window in Arcetri

On 17 May 2013, a new EPS Historic Site was inaugurated in Florence, Italy.

The site is the “Hill of Arcetri”, rich in buildings of considerable historical and scientific interest:

• the former Institute of Physics where, in 1926 Enrico Fermi wrote his fundamental work on the statistics that bears his name, and where young Gilberto Bernardini, first President and founder of the EPS…

ATLAS and CMS awarded for the discovery of a Higgs boson

In July 2012, the ATLAS and CMS collaborations announced the discovery of a new heavy particle at a mass around 125 GeV. Its properties were strikingly similar to those of a Higgs boson, a long-sought particle expected from the mechanism for electroweak symmetry breaking that was introduced almost 50 years ago by Robert Brout, François Englert and Peter Higgs.

Experimental confirmation of the Higgs boson presented monumental challenges because of its relatively large…

Fostering APS-EPS collaboration through CISA meetings

The spring meeting of the Committee for International Scientific Affairs [CISA] of the American Physical Society [APS] took place in Washington DC, on 11 May 2013. The meeting was attended by Luisa Cifarelli as EPS representative.

In a very lively and friendly atmosphere, based on “elective affinities” between the two societies, many relevant matters were discussed. The meeting, organized by Amy Flatten, APS Director for Scientific Affairs, was chaired by Alan Hurd and attended, in particular, by the Chairs (past and elect) of the APS Forum on International Physics [FIP]…

Twenty years of free, open web

On 30 April 1993, CERN made the technology behind the World Wide Web available for everyone to use. From that day on, the web has changed all aspects of society, a revolution that can be compared to the invention of the printing-press in the 15th century. To commemorate the 20th anniversary of the free, open web, CERN has started a project to preserve the digital assets that are associated with the birth of the web.

During the 1980s, the internet was already well-known in academic institutions, being mainly used for email…

Editorial – National Strengths

The European Physical Society [EPS] has a unique character amongst international learned societies. It fulfills a central federative role supporting its national member societies and it also carries out many highly successful specific European-scale actions through its Divisions and Groups, its conferences and its publications.

At first sight, it may seem that managing this dual role is intrinsically difficult but I cannot help but think that we make it more complicated than it really is. After all, the goal of the EPS is to support European-scale physics so…

Superstripes 2013

The Superstripes 2013 conference will be held from 27 May to 1 June 2013 in Ischia, Italy.

Superstripes 2013 will cover many aspect of “quantum in complex matter” including: nanoscale phase separation, complex magnetic structure in cuprates, graphene and intercalated graphite, and more.
The list of the speakers is already available on the conference website.

Registration opens on 27 April 2013…