EUNPC 2018: over 200 physicists met in Bologna to discuss nuclear physics from meV to TeV
The fourth edition of the European Nuclear Physics Conference (EUNPC 2018, (http://www.eunpc0218.infn.it) was held in Bologna (Italy), from 2nd to 7th September 2018. The previous editions were hosted in Bochum (De) in 2009, Bucharest (Ro) in 2012 and in Groningen (Nl) in 2015. More than 230 participants, from 27 different countries, joined the conference, attracted by a broad and comprehensive scientific program.
The conference kicked-off on 2 September, with the masterclasses: G. Martinez Pinedo, A. Görgen and P. D’Avanzo gave lectures on the intersection between nuclear physics and the gravitational wave observation. More than 40 PhD students had the opportunity to learn more on the r-process and the related heavy element production during the neutron star merger scenario and to go deeper into the implications of this major discovery on nuclear astrophysics.
The plenary sessions were scheduled in the morning throughout the conference. A wide range of topics was covered by 25 speakers from heavy ion physics to hadron and nuclear structure, from nuclear physics applications to nuclear astrophysics. A special session dedicated to the “Future facilities in construction” was organized by A. Bracco and F. Azaiez: The Fair Director (P. Giubellino), the DUBNA Deputy-Director (M. Itkis) and the EURISOL Steering Committee chair (M. Lewitowicz) spoke on the future plans of their research facilities and, at the end of the session, joined a round table.
The opening ceremony took place on 3rd September. After a short introduction from the conference LOC co-chairs (E. Scapparone and M. Taiuti), the participants were welcomed by the INFN-Bologna Director (G. Bruni), by the Italian Physical Society President (L.Cifarelli), by A. Zoccoli (INFN executive board member) and by the Chair of the EPS Nuclear Physics Board, N. Bianchi.
The first plenary session focused on Heavy ions and was chaired by R. Nania and by A. Ricci, 1989-1991 EPS President. Before the start of the session, he paid tribute to P. Bortignon, who passed away a few days before the start of EUNPC 2018.
The Lise Meitner prize was awarded by the EPS-Nuclear Physics Board chair, N. Bianchi: the winners of the 2018 prize edition were P. Ring (Munich Technical University) and P. Schuck (Institut de Physique Nucleaire, Orsay.) For further reading see the October issue of the e-EPS newsletter.
Parallel sessions were scheduled in the afternoon. Seventeen conveners selected more than 140 abstracts, to prepare a rich program, split in nine parallel sessions:
- Accelerators and Instrumentation
- Astroparticle Physics
- Few body
- Fundamental Symmetries
- Hadron structure, spectroscopy and dynamics
- Heavy Ion collisions and QCD phases
- Nuclear Astrophysics
- Nuclear Physics Applications
- Nuclear Structure and Dynamics.
Every afternoon, four parallel sessions were run. On Wednesday, participants had the possibility to visit the UNESCO World Heritage Ravenna monuments.
On Friday, 7th September, the last day of the conference, A. Zichichi, EPS president from 1978 to 1980, gave a talk on “EPS: roots and future”, reminding the audience the role of the Science in the culture of our time and the need for a project on Science for Peace.
Shortly after, N. Bianchi awarded the EPS PhD best thesis prize to Drs. R.F.G. Ruiz (KU, Lueven, Belgium), C.G. Bruno (University of Edinburgh, UK) and J.L.R.Sánchez (Univ. Santiago del Compostela, Spain).
F. Azaiez (former Nuclear Physics Board chair) announced that the IBA 2018 prize was awarded to Habib Zaidi, for hiscontributions to quantitative multimodality molecular imaging (PET/CT and PET/MRI).
The poster exhibition, during the conference, gave the possibility to the younger participants to show their research work: more than 20 posters were shown, and the three best posters were awarded with a prize supported by the NuPECC organisation. Each conference participant had the possibility to express her/his vote for the best poster. M. Lewitowicz (NuPECC chair) and A. Bracco (NuPECC former chair) awarded N. Marchini (Università di Firenze and INFN-Firenze), A. Manna (Università di Bologna and INFN-Bologna) and M. Franchini (Università di Bologna and INFN-Bologna).
The EUNPC 2018 proceedings will be published in Il Nuovo Cimento, by the Italian Physical Society. This edition will be also available in electronic form in open access.
The next EUNPC edition will be held in 2021: the call for bids to host EUNPC2021 will be out in Spring 2019 on e-EPS.
