During the Special Seminar of the NCBJ's Department of Fundamental Research, the awards of the Department's Director for the greatest scientific achievements of the past year were awarded in accordance with tradition. This time, awards were given for research into the role of dust in the evolution of galaxies, reflections on classical and quantum gravity, and work on symmetry violation in the decay of beauty mesons. The event took place on 30 June.

The development of high-speed trains brings further challenges in terms of safety. New materials that are used on railways, such as high-strength structural steel, must be checked , among other things, for internal damage (defects, cracks). NCBJ researchers in cooperation with the Railway Institute are developing new solutions for the use of radiography for non-destructive testing of rails and rail joints.

The Ministry of Industry has announced the results of the competition for the position of director of the National Centre for Nuclear Research. On 1 September this year, this position will be assumed by prof. dr hab. inż. Jakub Kupecki. Until 31 August, the duties of the director of the NCBJ are performed by prof. dr hab. Agnieszka Pollo.

New members of the Polish Academy of Sciences were elected on 26 June. An employee of the National Centre for Nuclear Research - Prof. Stanisław Mrówczyński, Director of the Department of Fundamental Research of the NCBJ - also joined the group of more than 300 outstanding researchers.

The Ministry of Science and Higher Education has announced a list of recipients of the Minister's scholarship for outstanding young scientists. Among those awarded is Tomasz Kwiatkowski, PhD, from the Nuclear Energy and Environmental Analysis Division at the National Centre for Nuclear Research. The scientist specialises in the analysis of turbulent flow in fuel cassettes of nuclear reactors.

Dr hab. Marcin Stolarski from the National Centre for Nuclear Research has been elected co-spokesperson of the COMPASS experiment. COMPASS is a high-energy physics experiment conducted at the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) accelerator at CERN in Switzerland, which aims to study hadron structure and hadron spectroscopy using high-energy muon and hadron beams.

Dr Sebastian Trojanowski from the NCBJ's Theoretical Physics Division was among this year's recipients of the Frontiers of Science Award presented by the International Congress of Basic Sciences in Beijing. The award was established to recognise the most momentous scientific papers published in the past 10 years in the fields of mathematics, theoretical physics and theoretical computer science with a particular focus on the achievements of early-career researchers.

Professor Wacław Gudowski from the National Centre for Nuclear Research has been awarded the 2025 Borelius Medal by the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. The award recognises outstanding contributions to nuclear research and education and a passion for inspiring new generations of students and scientists.

Thermoelectric (TE) materials, which convert waste heat into electricity, are gaining critical importance in addressing global energy challenges. In a significant breakthrough, scientists from the National Centre for Nuclear Research (NCBJ) in Poland, in collaboration with researchers from China, have achieved a significant enhancement of the TE performance of tungsten diselenide (WSe2), a two-dimensional (2D) material already known for its promising thermopower and environmental friendliness.

Atomic clocks, which rely on measuring the resonant frequency of atoms, can measure time with remarkable accuracy. In the scientific community, a strong candidate for a new atomic clock standard is the thorium-229 isotope. In a new paper just published in the journal Physical Review C, researchers from the NCBJ's Department of Nuclear Techniques and Equipment have described the isomeric excitation process and the potential for producing this isotope.