On November 12th, 2021 in the course of the Laura Bassi Forum, an event held to commemorate Bologna's famous 18th century female physicist, EPS Vice-President Petra Rudolf presented the EPS Gero Thomas Medal 2021 to Luisa Cifarelli. The medal is awarded to her "for ground breaking research in particle physics and for her lifelong and very impactful commitment to European collaboration in physics and to EPS."

Luisa Cifarelli has been Full Professor of Experimental Physics in Italian Universities since 1991. She is presently based at the University of Bologna. In the last twenty years she has been strongly involved in the design, construction and running of the very large size time-of-flight detector of ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) at CERN LHC (Large Hadron Collider), which is primarily devoted to study proton-proton, nucleus-nucleus (Pb-Pb) and proton-nucleus collisions at extreme energies. She currently participates also in the EEE experiment to search for extended air showers with an unprecedented network of muon tracking telescopes installed in high schools across the whole Italian territory and in the DarkSide project to search for dark matter at LNGS. The results of her work are documented in more than 900 scientific papers she co-authored throughout her career so far.

10 years ago Prof. Cifarelli was elected the first female president of EPS and among the many important initiatives she started in that role the EPS Historic Sites programme, where the 65 places of great importance for physics have been distinguished so far, is probably the best known. She also placed great emphasis on promoting diversity, and drove the creation of the Emmy Noether Distinction for Women in Physics. Moreover, she enhanced the communications tool of EPS by redesigning the website, and personally editing the regular electronic newsletter e-EPS, forged new links with international partner societies, increased the EPS’s membership with emphasis on Associate Members, significantly expanded the Young Minds programme and commissioned the first quantitative analysis on the Importance of Physics to the Economies of Europe. Luisa Cifarelli has had also a crucial role in scientific editing, where she has acted not only as member of editorial boards of various journals but also as Chief-Editor of La Rivista del Nuovo Cimento and EPJ Plus and served on the Board of Directors of EPL. 

Luisa Cifarelli - image credit: L. Cifarelli

The International Day of Light in 2020 was characterized by rapid reorganization to online and hybrid events, which yielded remarkable success. There were celebrations in 69 countries reaching an audience of 750,000+. You can find detailed results in this report.

We are now enthusiastically preparing for the International Day of Light 2021, and we anticipate a strong focus on hybrid and online events in many countries. Although virtual events cannot replace hands-on outreach, they do provide other opportunities to hear from a broad range of international speakers and allow us to reach a much larger audience. Therefore, one of our key aims in the coming months will be to provide resources and ideas to help effectively organize successful events in 2021 with the flexibility to adapt depending on how the global health situation evolves. We will also be developing new initiatives with international partners. One example is that we will be working especially closely with the International Astronomical Union to promote broad public engagement with science and highlight the wonder of the light from the cosmos.  

During 2020, we have seen more than ever the importance of science communication. There is a strong need to build public awareness that light science and technology provide not only our understanding of pandemics, but also the preventative measures, treatments and diagnostic tools to counter them. The emphasis of the International Day of Light in 2021 will be on improving means of outreach and interaction between science and society. As well as continuing to explain the many societal applications of light science, we will stress more widely the key messages of how appreciating and supporting science and technology is a necessary and central part of today’s interconnected world as well as a universal benefit to all. 

As we begin our planning and develop new resources for you, we encourage all within the International Day of Light community to continue following and engaging with our social media channels using the hashtag #LightDay2021 and the official channels: @IDLOfficial on Twitter, @DayOfLight2021 on Instagram,  and the @InternationalDayOfLight on Facebook. And once again, we acknowledge the continued commitment and support from the Steering Committee and other partners. Information about our partnership and how to get involved is here.

For further information, please contact the International Day of Light secretariat:

John Dudley
IDL 2018 Steering Committee Chair
Email: john.dudley@univ-fcomte.fr

Joseph Niemela
UNESCO-ICTP Category 1 Institute
Email: niemela@ictp.it

Bethany Downer
IDL Communications Coordinator
Email: contact@lightday.org