On the eve of the Nordita program

At this point, the upcoming weeks look interesting. There has been some last minute extra interest concerning both the program and the mid-term workshop on May 15-17. This event will be in particular packed with three full days of program... but, while one should give the participants a chance to work on science, we also will be kept busy with one or two daily talks for the bread-and-butter part of the schedule before and after the workshop.

It should also be acknowledged already, that we have had extra support for PhD students (from Sweden, the Access Foundation, from Finland, the National Graduate School for Materials Physics - which obviously also includes the physics of complex systems...).

The real scientific program will kick-off on Tuesday 6th by a talk from Luca Peliti from Naples. A glance at the rest of the week tells that in addition to "program events" there will also be talks by participants at other occasions and institutions in Stockholm: a welcome sign. Updates of the scientific life will be published here regularly.

Speaking of welcomes on Monday the 5th there will be a welcome event for the people who have reached Nordita already by then.

Now the program is shaping up: the participants' list is more or less ready, and what remains is to set up the daily list of activities. This will happen in April, after we (Mikko Alava and Erik Aurell) get back from the KITPC program in Beijing. Some of the last minute additions are: Luca Peliti (Napoli), Matteo Palassini (Barcelona), and Massimo Vergassola (Paris).

As regards the workshop, scientists who recently have signed up include Bart Selman (Cornell) and Scott Kirkpatrick (MIT, and HUJI). This proves that we do not have only physicists attending, I hope..... the deadline of the workshop is Feb. 29th, so there are still some days to go.

Last news of 2007

Both the program and the workshop have had a number of additions (in the former case Chin-Kun Hu, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan and Mesoon Ha, KAIST). We would like to welcome all.

The program and the workshop are now soliciting participants.

Notice that we offer Grants and they are partly reserved for Nordic and partly for all possible participants. The deadlines are on the actual webpages with details.

I wish everyone a happy 2008!

Some more exciting people to the workshop

The program of the program workshop is developing. At least three new names will be added shortly, Florent Krzakala (ESPCI, Paris), Jeremy Stripling (MIT), and Riccardo Zecchina (ICTP, Torino Polytechnic) are namely coming to Stockholm.