On 20 November 2018, the concluding day of the guest Session of the Committee of Plenipotentiary Representatives of the Governments of the JINR Member States in Romania, a scientific symposium was held dedicated to cooperation between Romania and JINR. The Symposium was held in the Horia Hulubei National Institute for R&D in Physics and Nuclear Engineering (IFIN HH) in the suburbs of Bucharest, Măgurele.

Read also the interview of JINR Vice-Director M.G. Itkis about the past CP Session

Plenipotentiary Representatives of the JINR Member States, the JINR Directorate and leading scientists of JINR, leaders of Romanian scientific organizations cooperating with the Joint Institute took part in the event. The Symposium was opened by President of the Section of Physical Sciences of the Romanian Academy, IFIN-HH Director General Nicolae-Victor Zamfir who told the audience about the European megascience project ELI-NP (Extreme Light Infrastructure — Nuclear Physics). Director General of the Institute of Atomic Physics (IFA), Plenipotentiary Representative of the Government of Romania at JINR Florin-Dorian Buzatu presented a report devoted to the current status of the JINR-Romania cooperation. On the part of JINR reports were delivered by JINR Vice-Director R. Lednický, who presented an overview of JINR, JINR Vice-Director V.D. Kekelidze, who reported on the present state of the NICA megasciense project, and Director of the Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions S.N. Dmitriev, who reported on the Factory of superheavy elements that is being prepared to the launch. At the end of the official part, participants of the Symposium had an excursion to the scientific centre “Extreme Light Infrastructure — Nuclear Physics” (ELI-NP) in Măgurele which is one of three centres of the European infrastructure mega-project ELI (Extreme Light Infrastructure).

On the same day after the Symposium, in the University of Bucharest, a meeting of the JINR representatives with leaders of the University was held. The University was represented by President of the Senate of the University Prof. Marian Preda, Rector of the University Mircea Dumitru, Prorector of the University Magdalena Iordache Platis, and Director of the Department of Structure of Matter, Physics of Atmosphere and Earth, Astrophysics Alexandru Jipa. The JINR party was represented by JINR Director V.A. Matveev, JINR Vice-Directors V.D. Kekelidze, R. Lednický and B.Yu. Sharkov, JINR Chief Scientific Secretary A.S. Sorin, and Advisor to the JINR Directorate R.V. Matveeva. The parties discussed opportunities and prospects for cooperation and academic exchange between JINR and the University of Bucharest. The visit of the delegation of the Bucharest University was concluded by a festive ceremony at which Professor Marian Preda awarded to JINR Director, RAS Academician V.A. Matveev with the diploma of an Doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Bucharest. Participants of the Session of the Committee of Plenipotentiaries and the JINR-Romania Symposium, representatives of the Directorate of the Bucharest University and the Romanian scientific community visited the ceremony. On the occasion of awarding the honorary title, the University of Bucharest issued a commemorative publication dedicated to the scientific career of Academician V.A. Matveev.

The day was concluded with a meeting of the JINR Directorate with leaders of the Ministry of Research and Innovation of Romania. JINR was represented by Director V.A. Matveev, Vice-Directors V.D. Kekelidze, R. Lednický and B.Yu. Sharkov, and JINR Chief Scientific Secretary A.S. Sorin. The Romanian party was represented by Minister of Science and Innovation Nicolae Hurduc, Secretary of State for Policy Research and Innovation Lucian Puiu Georgescu, General Secretary Dan Popescu, and Director on European and International Relations Viorel Vulturescu, as well as Nicolae-Victor Zamfir, IFIN-HH Director General, and Florin-Dorian Buzatu, IFA Director General. The parties discussed prospects for joint scientific research and possibilities of cooperation between JINR and IFIN-HH. The milestone of the meeting was signing of a Memorandum of Scientific Collaboration on the implementation of the Extreme Light Infrastructure – Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP) Project and the Nuclotron-based Ion Collider fAсility (NICA) Project between the “Horia Hulubei” National Institute of Physics and Nuclear Engineering and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research. The memorandum is aimed to become the basis for development of cooperation between the scientific centres in the frames of developing the ELI-NP and NICA experimental areas as well as defining the experimental programmes of the projects. Development of cooperation in the frames of the memorandum will also be centred around development of instrumentation for the projects and training high-skilled human resources in the field. Moreover, this document will help promotion of ELI-NP and NICA as the international user facilities.