On 14 October 2020, a staff member of the Laboratory of Theoretical Physics JINR Fedor Šimkovic received a prestigious award for Slovak scientists ESET Science Award established by ESET anti-virus company.

Fedor Šimkovic in BLTP JINR, 2019

The ESET Science Award is aimed to find and recognise exceptional representatives of Slovak science whose contribution is significant not only for Slovakia but for the entire international scientific community. The ESET Science Award is granted annually in three categories. Thus, in 2020, Fedor Šimkovic won the Award in the category “Outstanding Individual Contributor to Slovak Science”, Tamás Csanádi won the Award in the category “Exceptional young scientist in Slovakia under the age of 35”, and Ivan Varga became the winner in the category “Outstanding Academic”.

ESET Science Award 2020 laureates: Tamás Csanádi, Fedor Šimkovic and Ivan Varga. Photo: esetscienceaward.sk

An outstanding Slovak theoretician Fedor Šimkovic was honoured to receive the ESET Science Award 2020 in recognition of his considerable contribution to the theory of particle and nuclear physics, especially the physics of neutrino.

Professor of the Department of Nuclear Physics and Biophysics at Comenius University in Bratislava, Fedor Šimkovic has been a staff member of the BLTP JINR for many years. He is a very active contributor to the cooperation between JINR and the Slovak Republic. Fedor Šimkovic is the author of more than 270 articles (h-index=53), the supervisor of 6 Ph.D. and 9 Diploma theses. Being the organizer of many conferences and schools, he is one of the key organizers of the Pontecorvo International Neutrino Physics Summer Schools.

Nobel laureate 2017 Kip Thorne chaired the ESET Science Award International jury in 2020 who received the highest award together with two other representatives of the LIGO and VIRGO collaborations Rainer Weiss and Barry Barish for decisive contribution to the LIGO detector and the discovery of gravitational waves. It should be also noted that Prof Rolf-Dieter Heuer, CERN Director-General in 2009-2015, was one of the brilliant scientists included in the jury of the award.

On behalf of the JINR Directorate, we congratulate our colleague Fedor Šimkovic on receiving the high award!