Croatia is famous for its multitude of dream islands, for its wonderful blue Adriatic sea... and should be known also now as a nice place where astroparticle physics is growing.
The Republic of Croatia is one of the last countries that have joined the ASPERA European Network for astroparticle physics. Thus, the National Foundation for Science, Higher Education and Technological Development (NZZ) invited the ASPERA partners to the 15th National Day of the Network, on 27 May 2010.
The event was held in the beautiful city of Opatija situated on the Adriatic coast where NZZ just recently moved into its new domicile, a newly renovated old Wilhelminian style villa.
The goals of these national days are to present to the other members of the Network the particularities of the funding systems of each country and to identify the barriers to the development of astroparticle physics in the host country. It is expected that propositions for new collaborative funding mechanisms in Europe should emerge from these meetings.
About 40 participants, high level representatives of the Croatian science and funding system, as well as members of the ASPERA Network, met for a presentation of the Croatian science system and its activities in astroparticle physics. Responsible for funding science in Croatia is the Ministarstvo znanosti, obrazovanja i športa (MZOŠ), the Ministry of science, education, and sports of the Republic of Croatia. Generally speaking, scientific research in Croatia is monitored and conducted in six fields of science: natural sciences, technical, biomedical, biotechnical, social sciences, and humanities. Established in 2001, NZZ is in the process of becoming the main funding agency in Croatia to provide funding for R&D projects, support for junior researchers, and equipment.
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An interesting approach on the regional level was presented by Zaklada, a foundation of the University of Rijeka, which is providing financial support for the science community of the University of Rijeka on a smaller scale based on a budget that is raised by public sponsoring.
Astroparticle physics activities in Croatia mainly concentrate on groups at the Ruđer Bošković Institute in Zagreb and the University of Split. The groups are involved in international collaborations such as Auger, MAGIC, and CAST as well as in astroparticle physics theory. They also have developed tight links to scientists in essentially all neighbouring countries. It is worthwhile to mention that Croatia applied for membership to CERN and Croatian scientists are already involved in the CMS experiment, one of the big LHC particle detectors. Altogether, the Croatian astroparticle physicists form a small but enthusiastic community with internationally oriented scientific activities. |
On 27 May 2010, officials and physicists from Croatia met ASPERA representatives for the 15th National Day, aiming at better knowing each other, in the beautiful city of Opatija.
