A new EPS Historic Site to celebrate Bruno Pontecorvo’s centenary
The EPS Historic Sites programme of the European Physical Society [EPS] commemorates significant places in Europe for the progress and the history of physics, as a further demonstration of the EPS determination – since its birth in 1968 – to strengthen the cultural and scientific unity of Europe: east-west, north-south.
On 22 February 2013 a new EPS Historic Site was established in Dubna, Russia, at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research [JINR], on the occasion of the centennial of the eminent, world famous physicicst Bruno Pontecorvo. JINR is a very prestigious Associate Member institution of the EPS since 1990 and strong links exist between JINR researchers and the wide European community of physicists that the EPS represents.
A shiny brass plaque was unveiled at the entrance of the study of Bruno Pontecorvo inside the Dzhelepov Laboratory of Nuclear Problems [DLNP] of JINR. The text engraved on the brass highlights Pontecorvo’s work at JINR from 1950 until his death in 1993, in particular his concepts and ideas on neutrino oscillations which were actually discovered in neutrinos from the Sun and from the atmosphere, then confirmed with neutrinos from accelerators and reactors, thus providing the first hint of “Physics beyond the Standard Model”.
The unveiling ceremony took place in the presence of JINR Director, Victor Matveev, DLNP Director, Alexander Olshevskiy, distinguished Members of JINR Scientific Council and EPS President, Luisa Cifarelli. Also present were Pontecorvo’s son, Gil Pontecorvo, “Pontecorvo Prize 2012″ winner, Ettore Fiorini, and a delegation of the Italian National Institute of Nuclear Physics [INFN] which included INFN Vice-president, Antonio Masiero. The ceremony was followed by a touching visit to Pontecorvo’s study, still kept exactly as Pontecorvo left it.
