Networking between learned societies is a key endeavour in physics, and bridging the gap between international and national societies is an important part of that. The European Physical Society (EPS) embraces this principle with its federative nature and by directly supporting events going along such direction.

The EPS Young Minds Project, created with the aim of connecting young physicists all over the Euromediterranean area and foster their activities, also follows this path.

This Year, EPS Young Minds, collaborated with the Italian Physical Society (SIF) and the Italian Association of Physics Students (AISF) to organize a focus session aimed at young physicists in the context of the 108^th  SIF National Congress which took place in Milan from the 12^th to the 16^th of September.

The composition of  the organizing committee, formed by Dr. Antigone Marino (SIF Board Member), Federica De Domenico (AISF President) and Mattia Ostinato (EPS YM Action Committee Chair) and representatives of the local YM and AISF local groups, reflected the spirit of collaboration between different entities on both national and international level that societies such as SIF and EPS try to foster in their activities.

The session itself, was also devised to be deeply interdisciplinary, with a scientific program whose underlying theme was climate change and  energetic transition a topic highly appealing to young physicists

The event took place on the morning of the 15^th of September at the  Polytehnical University of Milan (PoliMi), and was opened by remarks from SIF President Prof. Angela Bracco, Dr. Marino, and Prof. Paolo Biagioni representing PoliMi, who welcomed the more then 50 students attendees.

After a brief introduction to YM and AISF, made by the respective chairs, the scientific session started with Prof Francesco Romanelli (University of Rome “Tor Vergata”) , who talked about the physics behind nuclear fusion and the state of the art technology currently employed in realizing fusion reactors for producing electrical energy. Its talk was followed by Dr. Davide Faccialà (Institute of photonics and nanotechnology- National Research Council), on how the techniques of ultrafast spectroscopy are used to investigate the energy harvesting properties of perovskites, and its application to the design of better performing solar panels.

The event was closed by Prof. Claudia Pasquero (University Milano Bicocca), whose talk was focused on the extreme interconnectedness of climate as a physical system, how physics studies it, and how even small changes can lead to extreme climate events.

The session had a very good success, reflected also by the intensity of the Q&A sessions, where the young participants showed all their interest for the topics and engaged in a fruitful discussion with all the speakers.

Such success is yet another example on how the interaction between national society like SIF and  international federative societies, such as EPS, can not only reinforce the bonds within them, but also foster the realization of important events and have an impact on the next generation of researchers.

image credit: Mattia Ostinato and Antigone Marino

Author: Antigone Marino

The Italian Physical Society (SIF) 106th National Congress was held from 14 to 18 September 2020. Due to the worldwide covid-19 emergency it was run for the first time in the SIF history electronically.

The big challenge was to organize a Congress with its scientific characteristics as much as possible in line with tradition, but with new elements possible thanks to IT tools.

The scheme of the Program followed the usual general lines. For the scientific part three levels of talks were given: General Reports were given in plenary sessions; Invited Reports were given in parallel, in seven virtual rooms, each one corresponding to the SIF topical sessions; Communications were uploaded on the conference website as recorded presentation. For General and Invited Reports all the speakers spoke live with the possibility of intervention with comments and questions from the participants. Activities related to the SIF management were also conducted online, such as the Annual Report of the President Angela Bracco, the SIF awards ceremony, and the General Assembly of Members.

The Congress numbers confirm the large and exciting participation by the community of Italian physicists. More than 1400 registrations, compared with the 500 made in the past non-virtual editions. A number that was the success of the free registration, and the possibility of participating from anywhere in the world or Italy. The set of 10 General Reports, more than 220 Invited talks in parallel sections and 600 Communications, provided more than 135 hours of streaming, and more than 500 questions.

During the Congress there was the traditional Youth Session devoted to the new generations of physicists, organized in collaboration with the Italian Association of Physics Students (AISF), national branch of the International Association of Physics Students (IAPS).

Also this year the SIF Equal Opportunities Committee (CPO) presented an original and effective initiative for the Congress. The seven virtual rooms were dedicated to seven female scientists, to give them the visibility that they often did not have throughout history. To further highlight the peculiarity of a congress taking place in a non-place, each virtual lecture hall was represented by a nice photo of a historic lecture hall of an Italian universities or research centers.

SIF is proud of how the emergency was faced, by proposing and implementing solutions aimed at carrying out our traditional and backbone activities, such as our annual Congress. Anyway, we hope that the next one can be held live.

For more information, visit the event website: http://congresso2020.sif.it/