Physics Days 2020: State of the SmART Physics & Something Blue

Something new, something old, something blue and something borrowed” – these were the words we used at the closing ceremony of Physics Days 2019 to invite attendees to Physics Days 2020 to be organized in Kuopio. Now we are happy to open the curtain a bit as registration and abstract submission is about to open.

For the first time in Physics Days history, at least as far as we know, we organize a special startup session. During the session we will hear information about IPR aspects and financing opportunities of startups. We will also here experiences from an early stage startup as well as a startup already made the exit. The session will be ended by pitching talks from early stage startups and TUTLI projects. The old part of the Physics Days will be the solid and traditional structure of scientific conference. We will have plenary talks from international esteemed professors representing research areas of physics at the University of Eastern Finland.

Aerosol Physics will be represented by Professor Ilona Riipinen from the Stockholms Universitet. Professor Riipinen’s research focuses on understanding the sources, sinks and evolution of atmospheric aerosol particles and their interactions with clouds, climate and human health. Professor Simon Arridge from the University College London will have a talk “Imaging with sound and light”. His research is on inverse problems in imaging. Recent work has focused on combining variational methods based on computational models of the forward problem with learning-based methods. “Tuning physical interaction with cells and tissues through spatial patterning of multiscale materials”, this material physics talk is given by Professor Ennio Tasciotti from Houston Methodist Research Institute. Professor Tasciotti’s research interests include e.g. nanostructured hydrogels and nanovectors for the localized sustained release of clinically approved drugs. Professor Hanna Isaksson from Lund University is medical physics expert especially in musculoskeletal biomechanics. Professor Isaksson talk is entitled as “The skeleton, a mechanical structure that can make or break!”. Photonics is represented by Professor Ayman Abouraddy from the University of Central Florida. Professor Abouraddy has established facilities for fabricating new classes of polymer and soft-glass fibers for applications ranging from mid-infrared optics to solar energy concentration. Plenary talk sessions will accompany traditional parallel and poster sessions.

Something blue and the slogan for the Physics Days 2020 “State of the SmART Physics” is borrowed from the current brand of University of Eastern Finland. The slogan also refers to the ART competition we launch in the conference. We encourage the attendees to send artistic images, animations or videos related to their conference presentation to be part of the ART competition during the days. We also hope that somebody from the attendees will find some blue-sky thinking during the conference.

There will also be a Studia Generalia (in Finnish) during the conference. This event, aimed also for general audience including e.g. high school students, will be on “Health, exercise and physics” and the speakers are MD, specialist in sports medicine Pippa Laukka and high performance director (ski jumping) in Team China, Mika Kojonkoski.

At least one surprise we hold till the conference. We will have an Award Winning local surprise during the poster session.

Welcome to Physics Days 2020 in Kuopio, March 17-19, 2020! We promise you the Physics Days like ever before.

Professor Vesa-Pekka Lehto, chairman of the Program Committee

Research Manager Tero Karjalainen, chairman of the Organizing Committee