Edito
by Prof. Oystein Fischer

2006 : a busy year for MaNEP

As the end of the year gets closer, let me highlight some important issues that lay ahead of us for 2006.

First of all, in 2006, superconductivity researchers in all the world will celebrate the 20th anniversary of High Tc superconductors and honour our Swiss Nobel-winners Karl-Alex Müller and Georg Bednorz. We know that an important event will take place at the Physics Institute of the University of Zurich and it goes without saying that MaNEP will as well contribute to this celebration year.

In February, MaNEP will also play an important role in the annual SPS Meeting. This will be the second time we are strongly involved in this and I hope this new contribution will be as good as the first one. You can now register and submit your abstract online (see our Highlights section).

In 2005, we noticed that MaNEP is clearly getting more visible in the outside : our superconductivity demos (the ‘flying train’ in particular), for instance, are more often displayed at our partner’s Open Days, as well as during Education Days and all kinds of events aimed at the general public. This trend should continue in 2006, to our satisfaction, as this is part of our communication mission.

But then the need emerges to both improve our existing demos and create new ones. Several people in Geneva have started working on this.We will also have to find ways to encourage people in MaNEP to participate in all these events, but without it becoming a burden.

In this fourth issue of MaNEP’s E-Newsletter, I want to acknowledge MaNEP’s former member Prof. Albert Furrer who was awarded a prestigious prize by the ENSA. He was also interviewed in our Profile section.

Finally, I would like to thank the contributors to this issue, as some of them have even provided spontaneous texts. So please…. keep at it !