Category: europlanet-people

Farinella Prize 2022 – deadline extended

May 3, 2022

Extended deadline for 12th ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize, 2022

The DEADLINE for nominations for this year’s Farinella Prize is extended to May 15th 2022.

The 12th Paolo Farinella Prize will be awarded to a young scientist with outstanding contributions in the field of planetary science concerning ‘Asteroids: Physics, Dynamics, Modelling and Observations‘, including theoretical, modelling, experimental and observational work on asteroids. The award winner will be honoured during the Europlanet Science Congress (EPSC) 2022 in Granada (Spain).

For the 12th ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize the terms and rules are as follows:

  1. A competition is announced to award the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize for the year 2022. The Prize consists of a plate, a certificate and the amount of 1500 €. The winner is expected to give a Prize lecture during EPSC2022.
  2. The winner will be selected on the basis of their overall research results in the field of ‘Asteroids: Physics, Dynamics, Modelling and Observations‘. 
  3. Nominations must be sent by email not later than May 1st to the following addresses: michelp@oa.eu, acb@ua.es and david.lucchesi@inaf.it, using the downloadable form.
  4. The nominations for the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize can be made by any researcher that works in the field of planetary sciences following the indications in the attached form. Self-nominations are acceptable. The candidates should have international and interdisciplinary collaborations and should be not older than the age of Paolo when he passed away, 47 years, as of 1 May 2022. 
  5. The winner of the Prize will be selected before 20 June 2022 by the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize Committee composed of outstanding scientists in planetary sciences, with specific experience in the field. 
  6. The Prize Committee will consider all the nominations, but it will be entitled to autonomously consider other candidates.

To honour the memory and the outstanding figure of Paolo Farinella (1953-2000), an extraordinary scientist and person, a Prize has been established in recognition of significant contributions in the fields of interest of Paolo, which spanned from planetary sciences to space geodesy, fundamental physics, science popularisation, security in space, weapon control and disarmament.

The Prize has been proposed during the ‘International Workshop on Paolo Farinella, the scientist and the man‘, held in Pisa in 2010.

Previous recipients of the ‘Paolo Farinella Prize’ were:

‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize homepage.

Call for Farinella Prize 2022

March 21, 2022

Call for 12th ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize, 2022

To honour the memory and the outstanding figure of Paolo Farinella (1953-2000), an extraordinary scientist and person, a Prize has been established in recognition of significant contributions in the fields of interest of Paolo, which spanned from planetary sciences to space geodesy, fundamental physics, science popularisation, security in space, weapon control and disarmament.

The Prize has been proposed during the ‘International Workshop on Paolo Farinella, the scientist and the man‘, held in Pisa in 2010.

Previous recipients of the ‘Paolo Farinella Prize’ were:

The 12th Paolo Farinella Prize will be awarded to a young scientist with outstanding contributions in the field of planetary science concerning ‘Asteroids: Physics, Dynamics, Modelling and Observations‘, including theoretical, modelling, experimental and observational work on asteroids. The award winner will be honoured during the Europlanet Science Congress (EPSC) 2022 in Granada (Spain).

For the 12th ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize the terms and rules are as follows:

  1. A competition is announced to award the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize for the year 2022. The Prize consists of a plate, a certificate and the amount of 1500 €. The winner is expected to give a Prize lecture during EPSC2022.
  2. The winner will be selected on the basis of their overall research results in the field of ‘Asteroids: Physics, Dynamics, Modelling and Observations‘. 
  3. Nominations must be sent by email not later than May 1st to the following addresses: michelp@oa.eu, acb@ua.es and david.lucchesi@inaf.it, using the downloadable form.
  4. The nominations for the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize can be made by any researcher that works in the field of planetary sciences following the indications in the attached form. Self-nominations are acceptable. The candidates should have international and interdisciplinary collaborations and should be not older than the age of Paolo when he passed away, 47 years, as of 1 May 2022. 
  5. The winner of the Prize will be selected before 20 June 2022 by the ‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize Committee composed of outstanding scientists in planetary sciences, with specific experience in the field. 
  6. The Prize Committee will consider all the nominations, but it will be entitled to autonomously consider other candidates.

‘Paolo Farinella’ Prize homepage.

Károly Szegő, 1943-2022

January 28, 2022
Károly Szegő at a Europlanet Dinner Debate in the European Parliament in 2011.
Károly Szegő at a Europlanet Dinner Debate in the European Parliament in 2011.

Károly Szegő, 1943-2022

We are deeply saddened to hear that Károly Szegő DSc, Scientific Advisor and  Professor Emeritus of the Wigner Research Centre, died unexpectedly on 22 January 2022, at the age of 78.

Károly was one of the founders of Europlanet, leading the Personnel Exchange Activity in the original European Planetology Network (EuroPlaNet) project funded by the European Commmission from 2005-2008, the Deputy Coordinator of the Networking Activities in the first Europlanet Research Infrastructure (RI) from 2009-2012, and was the Inclusiveness Officer and Deputy Lead of the Science and Innovation Networking Activity in the Europlanet 2020 RI project from 2015-2019.

Prof Nigel Mason said: ‘We will all remember him as staunch supporter of Europlanet as well as for his outstanding science.’

Obituary

By Péter Lévai, Director General of Wigner Research Centre for Physics
(Original version on Wigner website)

Károly Szegő began his career as a theoretical particle physicist investigating the applications of group theory methods. His interest turned towards space physics in the early 1980s, he made important contributions to the understanding of the interaction between the solar wind and solar system bodies, including several planets and comets.

He was a co-lead in the VEGA Space Mission (1986), a Soviet led international effort launched to investigate comet Halley up close. In the course of this research, the first ever picture of an active cometary nucleus was taken, the size and rotation of the nucleus were determined, and a model of the surface activity of the comet was established. Four of his scientific publications published in the period 1980-87 are among the 7 most cited publications of the field of “Solar System Research” worldwide. His achievements were recognized with the State Prize of Hungary in 1986.

Later he was a guest researcher on NASA’s Pioneer-Venus Orbiter mission, and as a co-investigator he participated in the plasma physics experiments of the Phobos-2 mission launched in 1988 to study planet Mars and its environment. He achieved significant results in the study of Venus. He was a co-investigator in the plasma physics experiments of the Cassini mission launched by NASA to study planet Saturn. He also participated as a co-investigator in the plasma experiments of the ESA Rosetta comet chaser mission which performed the first ever soft landing on a cometary nucleus in 2014 and investigated the surface and environment of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. In recent years he participated in the SERENA plasma experiment of the ESA BepiColombo mission, which has been sent to investigate planet Mercury.

Károly Szegő was the first director of the KFKI Research Institute for Particle and Nuclear Physics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (the predecessor of Wigner RCP) from its establishment in 1975 until 2002. Between 2002 and 2012 he organized and supported the work of the Hungarian academic research network as the head of the Department of Research Institutes of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He was an internationally recognized scientist and scientific organizer and a major presence in the Hungarian space research community, educating and mentoring many students and postdocs, always approachable and always helping colleagues.

Rest in peace, Károly, we keep your memory alive.

We will all remember him as staunch supporter of Europlanet as well as for his outstanding science.

Prof Nigel Mason
The launch of the Europlanet Research Infrastructure (RI) , 3 March 2009, CNRS, Paris.
Károly Szegő (end of top row, right) at the launch of the Europlanet Research Infrastructure (RI) , 3 March 2009, CNRS, Paris.

Europlanet 2024 RI has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 871149.
Europlanet AISBL (Association Internationale Sans But Lucratif - 0800.634.634) is hosted by the Department of Planetary Atmospheres of the Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB), Avenue Circulaire 3, B-1180 Brussels, Belgium.