January 2025 - TOPICS
Short News The 2025 "Best PhD thesis Prize - Emilios Harlaftis" Call for new A&A Associate Editors Job opportunities 2' Science: Celebrating Four Years of Active Presence Upcoming Astronomy Meetings and Schools in Greece About this Newsletter
1. Short News
The GC wishes to all members of Hel.A.S. a Happy, Healthy and Productive NEW YEAR 2025! The Society would like to congratulate Dr. Stella Boula and the former president of Hel.A.S. Prof. Apostolos Mastichiadis, who were recently awarded the "2024 Prize in Memory of Academician Ioannis N. Xanthakis", by the Academy of Athens for their publication “Expanding one-zone model for blazar emission”. The prize is awarded "for scientific work by a Greek researcher in Greek, English or French in the field of Astronomy, Astrophysics or Space Sciences". The Society would like to congratulate the former president of Hel.A.S. Prof. Apostolos Mastichiadis, who was elected as an Emeritus Professor at the Physics Department of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. The Society would like to congratulate Dr. Georgios Vasilopoulos who was recently appointed Assistant Professor at the Physics Department of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. Dr. Vasilopoulos specializes in observational high-energy astrophysics, with a focus on accreting compact object. The Society extends its best wishes for further successes in his professional pursuits. The Society would like to congratulate Dr. Stavros Akras who was recently sworn in before the President of the National Observatory of Athens, Prof. Manolis Plionis, as a Senior Researcher at the Institute of Astronomy, Astrophysics, Space Applications, and Remote Sensing (IAASARS). Dr. Akras specializes in observational astrophysics in optical and infrared wavelengths, with a focus on the late stages of stellar evolution in low-mass stars. The Society extends its best wishes for further successes in his professional pursuits. The Society would like to congratulate Alexandros Tsouros who has recently defended successfully his PhD entitled “Reconstructing the Milky Way’s Local Magnetic Field for the Inference of Ultrahigh Energy Cosmic Ray Source” at the Univ. of Crete, under the supervision of Prof. V. Pavlidou. Dr. Tsouros will continue his academic journey as a postdoctoral fellow at École Normale Supérieure Paris (France). The Society extends its best wishes for further success in his professional pursuits. The Society would like to congratulate Nikos Mandarakas who has recently defended successfully his PhD entitled “Preparing for a new era of magnetic interstellar medium tomography in the context of the PASIPHAE survey” at the Univ. of Crete, under the supervision of Prof. K. Tassis. The Society extends its best wishes for further success in his professional pursuits. The Society would like to congratulate Savvas Chanlardis who has recently defended successfully his PhD entitled “Numerical Modeling of the Formation and Evolution of Neutron Stars” at the Univ. of Crete, under the supervision of Dr. J. Antoniadis. The Society extends its best wishes for further success in his professional pursuits. The Society would like to inform our members that recently the national representatives to the Science Programme Committee (SPC) of  the European Space Agency have changed and Greece is now represented by Prof. Ioannis Daglis and Dr. Anezina Solomonidou.
2. The 2025 "Best PhD thesis Prize - Emilios Harlaftis"
On September 1, 2020 the Governing Council of Hel.A.S. accepted a generous offer by the family of Dr. Emilios Harlaftis, an active member of our Society who passed away at an early age in 2005, and unanimously decided to rename “Best PhD thesis Prize" awarded by the Society every two years, to “Best PhD thesis Prize- Emilios Harlaftis”. The statues and application procedure of the award remain as in the past. Applications for the "2025 Best PhD thesis Prize - Emilios Harlaftis" are now open. They are restricted to Junior members of the Society, who have successfully defended their Ph.D. thesis between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2024. The application deadline is January 31, 2025. Additional information is available here.
3. Call for new A&A Associate Editors
The Board of Directors of Astronomy & Astrophysics invites applications for three Associate Editor positions in the following broad research areas: Two positions in Extragalactic Astrophysics One position in Solar Physics Applications received by January 31, 2025 will receive full consideration. For more details visit the A&A webpage.
4. Job Opportunities
11 PhD positions on the feeding and feedback cycle of supermassive black holes are available at 10 astronomy groups across Europe from September 2025 as part of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action Doctorate Network TALES (Time-domain Analysis to study the Life-cycle and Evolution of Supermassive black holes). Details and application information can be found at the links below: https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/280409 https://www.star.bris.ac.uk/TALES/ or via email to Antonis Georgakakis (age@noa.gr). The mw-atlas project invites applications for PhD positions, to be held at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Garching, Germany, at RWTH Aachen University in Aachen, Germany, and at the Institute for Astrophysics - FORTH at Heraklion, Crete. Funded by an ERC Synergy grant, mw-atlas aspires to construct the first self-consistent, comprehensive, three-dimensional atlas of the Milky Way in all of its components, based on available and upcoming multi-wavelength datasets, on the physical interconnections between components, on the mathematical framework of Information Field Theory, and its usage in medical imaging or Earth monitoring. For more information, check the job advertisements link1 , link2.
5. 2' Science: Celebrating Four Years of Active Presence
We would like to inform you on the activities of the science outreach group 2'Science, which started four years ago with the support of Hel.A.S. The goal of this initiative is to present scientific topics to the public via a series of short articles, podcasts and other activities, while also answering questions from its readers.  During its first four years it has published ~270 articles from ~70 authors, as well as ~90 answers to reader questions, numerous fun facts and ‘on this day’ posts, podcasts on Spotify with audio versions of its articles as well as some interviews. The members of the 2'science group would appreciate it if you could advertise their activities to your colleagues, and if you wish to contribute, feel free to contact the team! Visit the website: https://2science.gr/ Check the social media: https://www.facebook.com/2sciencegr , https://www.instagram.com/2sciencegr/
6. Upcoming Astronomy Meetings and Schools in Greece
UniverseAI: Exploring the Universe with Artificial Intelligence June 2-6, 2025, Amphitheater G. Karabatzos, Harokopio University of Athens, Greece 17th Hel.A.S. Conference 30 June - 2 July 2025, Conference and Cultural Center of the University of Patras, Greece
7. 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 February 1, 2025. Please send your announcements (e.g., appointments / departures, job openings, research opportunities, awards, conferences in Greece) or comments before January 25, 2024. 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. at secretary@helas.gr.