MAY 2015 - TOPICS

Short News 12th Hel.A.S. Conference - Update Hel.A.S. Directory - Confirm your Membership Info Greek Astronomy PhDs National Archive of PhD dissertations Research Studentships - Nordic Optical Telescope RCAAM Lecture Series - Year of Light 2015 Upcoming Astronomy Meetings in Greece About this Newsletter

1. Short News

Dr. Chryssa Kouveliotou recently retired from NASA and moved on to an academic position as a Professor with George Washington University in Washington, DC. Within the next 5 years, Dr. Kouveliotou will enhance the astrophysics group of GWU with two additional tenure track faculty hires (one of them already in place, the next planned for 2016), several postdoctoral fellows and graduate students and will create a new GWU center for Astrophysics. We would like to congratulate Dr. Kouveliotou and wish her every success in her new duties.

2. 12th Hel.A.S. Conference - Update

We remind our members that Abstract Submission is now closed. We have received about 160 abstracts and we are looking forward to having a very interesting and fruitful meeting! The Convenors of each Session will review all abstracts and send notifications of acceptance by May 15. More information about the meeting (poster, programme, social events, hotel information) will be posted on the conference web-site this coming week. Also, note that, for Junior members that have submitted a presentation, a Travel Grant application form (to be sent to the Secretary) will be posted on the conference website (see http://www.helas.gr/conf/2015/financial.php ). The GC has received numerous requests from Hel.A.S members, about the possibility of reducing the registration fee (90 euros) for non-members that may be MSc students (or just started on their PhD) and wish to attend the meeting. After careful consideration, the GC decided to offer a reduced fee (30 euros) only to MSc or PhD students (non-members) whose participation to the meeting is endorsed by a senior Hel.A.S. member. The relevant application form (to be signed by both the applicant and the proposing Hel.A.S. member) will be posted next week at http://www.helas.gr/conf/2015/financial.php. The applicants will then be notified by the Secretary to register through the web-site.

3. Hel.A.S. Directory - Confirm your Membership Info

All members of the Society are strongly encouraged to visit the online membership directory of Hel.A.S. (available in English as well as in Greek) in order to verify that their personal information, including postal address, membership status, e-mail and phone/fax numbers, is correct. If you notice a mistake on your record, or that of a colleague, please inform the Secretary of Hel.A.S. (Prof. K. Tsiganis). The Society relies on this information for all mailings to the members. In particular, we remind our members to notify the Secretary of Hel.A.S. on any recent change to their status. Junior members that may have recently received their PhD should become senior members in the coming General Assembly (Thessaloniki meeting). If any of your PhD students has graduated, please inform us. Also, ordinary members that may have retired during this year (or, are about to) may be exempt from paying annual fees in the future, upon request.

4. Greek Astronomy PhDs

We wish to inform all members of Hel.A.S. that the list with all PhDs in astrophysics, dynamical astronomy and space physics awarded by Greek Universities from 1886 until 2014 has been completed. The list, which contains details on 238 PhD graduates is available as a PDF file at: http://www.helas.gr/reports/astro_phd.pdf We would greatly appreciate if all members of the Society, in particularly the senior ones, review the information provided about those past PhDs and send any updates/corrections to Prof. V. Charmandaris. A brief presentation with a statistical analysis of this information will be presented during the upcoming General Assembly of the Society.

5. National Archive of PhD Dissertations

We would like to inform all members of the Society that the National Documentation Centre (ΕΚΤ) has created a central repository to host all PhD dissertations awarded by Greek institutions, as well as those obtained by Greeks abroad. Currently there are over 31,000 theses in the archive. If your PhD is not included, you have the possibility to provide the necessary information to add it in the list. More information is available at: http://www.didaktorika.gr/eadd/aboutEADD.jsp#about8

6. Research Studentships - Nordic Optical Telescope

The Nordic Optical Telescope (NOT) invites applications for Research Studentships starting at any time from spring 2015 onward. The deadline for receipt of applications is Friday, May 15, 2015. For more details on the student programme and how to apply, see: http://www.not.iac.es/general/studentships/

7. RCAAM Lecture Series - Year of Light 2015

The Research Center for Astronomy and Applied Mathematics of the Academy of Athens is organising a series of Public Lectures (in Greek), in the framework of the UNESCO-sponsored "International Year of Light", 2015. The lectures will be given by RCAAM Researchers and Visiting Researchers. The programme and other information can be found at: http://astro.academyofathens.gr/light2015/

8. Upcoming Astronomy Meetings in Greece

The following meetings are scheduled to take place in Greece during 2015-2016: The Olympian Symposium 2015: Cosmology and the Epoch of Reionization 18-22 May, 2015 Gas, Dust, and Star-Formation in Galaxies from the Local to Far Universe Chania, Greece, 25-29 May, 2015 Thessaloniki Workshop on Binary Neutron Star Mergers Thessaloniki, 27-29 May, 2015 The 12th Hellenic Astronomical Conference Thessaloniki, 28 June - 2 July, 2015 Demographics and environment of AGN from multi-wavelength surveys Chania, 21-24 September, 2015 Supernova Remnants: An Odyssey in Space after Stellar Death Chania, Crete, Greece, 6-11 June, 2016

9. About this Newsletter

This Newsletter was sent to all members of Hel.A.S. who have e-mail access. The next edition of the Newsletter will be mailed around June 1st, 2015. Please send your announcements (e.g. appointments/departures, job openings, research opportunities, awards, conferences in Greece) or comments before May 26, 2015. If you do not wish to receive future issues of this Newsletter or the e-mail address to which it was sent is not your preferred one, please inform the Secretary of Hel.A.S.