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EPJ E Highlight - EPJ E: Soft Matter and Biological Physics – the past and the future
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- Published on 08 May 2026
A new editorial in EPJ E reflects on the journal’s role in uniting diverse soft-matter communities, and anticipates the challenges of maintaining interdisciplinary dialogue as the field expands.
Soft matter encompasses a diverse array of structures, including liquid crystals, polymers and biopolymers, and even living cells and tissues. While they are often complex, all of these materials display extremely strong responses to weak perturbations, including mechanical, chemical, and electrical influences. Increasingly, these properties are being explored across a vast array of applications, driving deeper questions about how the fascinating behaviour of soft materials is linked to their constituent molecular parts.
First founded in 2000, EPJ E: Soft Matter and Biological Physics has long been a cornerstone of soft matter research. In one of the first papers of the EPJ E 25th Anniversary Collection: Past Insights, Present Voices, Future Horizons, Jean‑François Joanny at Collège de France, together with Günter Reiter at Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, reflect on its prolific past while anticipating the challenges and opportunities it will likely face in the future.
EPJ Plus Highlight - Morphology shapes the performance of perovskite X-ray detectors
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- Published on 08 May 2026
Researchers have identified a key trade-off between the thickness and the quality of the film of hybrid perovskite devices and their performance in flexible X-ray detectors
Thin films of hybrid perovskites have emerged as promising candidates for optoelectronic devices, including radiation detectors, but much remains to be learned about how their performance is linked to their morphology.
Through new analysis published in EPJ Plus, Sara Cepić and colleagues at the University of Bologna, Italy, have gained detailed insights into the link between film morphology and the performance of a perovskite-based X-ray detector. Their results could help researchers in future studies to optimise the performance of radiation detectors.
EPJ H Highlight - From Hole Theory to Quantum Field Theory
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- Published on 08 May 2026
New analysis reconstructs a pivotal transition in physicists' understanding of fermionic quantum fields, tracing how Ettore Majorana's largely overlooked 1937 work helped shape the modern framework of Quantum Field Theory
Since its earliest origins in the 1920s, Quantum Field Theory (QFT) has come to underpin our understanding of the universe's most fundamental particles and forces. Among the most important stages in its development was a period from 1933 to 1937, when relativistic fermions were widely studied in the context of Dirac's Hole theory – which suggested that a vacuum exists as a 'sea' of negative energy states, each fully occupied by an electron. As this framework was gradually superseded, QFT began its gradual and consistent construction.
Through new analysis published in EPJ H: Historical Perspectives on Contemporary Physics, Francesco Vissani at The National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN), Italy, reconstructs the crucial stages of this transition, highlighting the seminal role played by Italian theorist Ettore Majorana.
EPJ TI Highlight - Advanced software sharpens scintillation images of low-energy gamma rays
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- Published on 23 April 2026
By combining a monolithic scintillation detector with analytical and machine learning methods, researchers have pushed its resolution beyond the limits of its hardware when measuring low-energy gamma rays.
Scintillation detectors are vital tools in fields ranging from medical imaging to fundamental physics. When excited by ionizing radiation, they emit pulses of light which can be converted into electrical signals, allowing researchers to precisely determine the energy and intensity of incoming radiation. So far, however, most detector designs have been limited to segmented crystals, which are both complex to manufacture and leave dead spaces between segments that limit their efficiency. While the problem is now being addressed in measurements of higher-energy radiation, low-energy detectors have fallen behind.
In a new study published in EPJ Techniques and Instrumentation, researchers have demonstrated how low-energy gamma rays can be precisely measured using scintillation detectors made from continuous, monolithic crystals. Carried out by Gabriel Turturica, Bogdan Temelie, and Violeta Iancu at the Extreme Light Infrastructure – Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP), Horia Hulubei National Institute for R&D in Physics and Nuclear Engineering, the approach could unlock new capabilities for radiation detection across a diverse array of fields.
EPJ H Highlight - Suraj N. Gupta: Retracing the contributions of a quantum gravity pioneer
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- Published on 23 April 2026
A new historical overview retraces the early work of Suraj N. Gupta, whose pioneering efforts explored how Einstein’s description of gravity could be brought into the framework of quantum mechanics.
Suraj Narayan Gupta (1924–2021) was a theoretical physicist born in India, who served at Wayne State University in Detroit from 1956. While he is best known for his contributions to quantum electrodynamics, he was also among the first to describe gravity using the language of quantum mechanics. Yet despite his pioneering role in one of the most vibrant fields of theoretical physics, his work in this area has largely been forgotten.
Through a new study published in EPJ H: Historical Perspectives on Contemporary Physics, Savan Hirpara at the University of Helsinki presents a historical overview of Gupta’s research, shedding new light on his contributions to the early development of quantum gravity.
EPJD Topical Issue : Exploring dissociative electron attachment: Insights from the 4th DEA Club Meeting (2024)
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- Published on 16 April 2026
Guest Editors: João Ameixa, Juraj Fedor, Ilko Bald, Nigel Mason, Sylwia Ptasinska
The Topical Issue "Exploring Dissociative Electron Attachment: Insights from the 4th DEA Club Meeting", highlights recent contributions by the dissociative electron attachment (DEA) community, which were conceived in close connection with the 4th DEA Club Meeting held in June 2024 in Potsdam, Germany.
Anna Grigoryan new representative of the EPS Young Minds in EPJ Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC)
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- Published on 24 March 2026
The Steering Committee of EPJ is delighted to welcome Anna Grigoryan, as the representative of the EPS Young Minds which joined the Scientific Advisory Committee two years ago. She is replacing Carlos Damián Rodríguez Fernández.
The scientific community is pleased to highlight Anna Grigoryan, a PhD student and researcher in experimental nuclear physics at the A.I. Alikhanyan National Science Laboratory (Yerevan, Armenia), where she works within the Experimental Physics Division. Anna is currently pursuing her PhD, focusing on nucleon structure and spin phenomena in semi-inclusive deep inelastic scattering. Her research is centered on the study of dihadron production and beam-helicity asymmetries using data from the HERMES experiment at DESY, contributing to a deeper understanding of the three-dimensional structure of the nucleon. She is a member of the Structure and Spectroscopy of Hadrons Project (SHARP) COST Action, as well as a member of EPS Technology and Innovation Group (EPS TIG). In addition to her research activities, Anna Grigoryan is actively involved in scientific outreach and community leadership. She is a member of the EPS Young Minds Action Committee and has contributed significantly to the organization of international masterclasses and physics events in her local institution, promoting education and engagement in particle and nuclear physics.
EPJ Web of Conferences Highlight – 18th European Workshop on Modern Developments and Applications in Microbeam Analysis
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- Published on 20 March 2026
The 18th Workshop of the European Microbeam Analysis Society (EMAS) on Modern Developments and Applications in Microbeam Analysis took place in Mataró, Spain from 11-15 May 2025.
The EMAS European Workshops have been organized every second year since its beginning in 1989 (with the exception of 2021), with the primary aim of evaluating the state-of-the-art and reliability of microbeam analysis techniques.
Farewell Antonino Zichichi
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- Published on 18 March 2026
Professor Emeritus at the University of Bologna, Member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the Academia Europaea and the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna, and founder of the "Ettore Majorana" Centre for Scientific Culture in Erice, he held numerous prominent roles in the international scientific community. These included President of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN), the "Enrico Fermi" Historical Museum of Physics and Study and Research Centre, the European Physical Society, the World Federation of Scientists, and the World Laboratory. For the full obituary we refer to Antonino Zichichi (1929-2026).
When in 1999 Zeitschrift für Physik A and C as well as Il Nuovo Cimento A merged to form The European Physical Journal A and C (EPJA and EPJC), Prof. Zichichi became Editor-in-Chief of EPJC alongside Peter Zerwas and Dieter Haidt. He promoted the new journal, in particular to young scientists at the occasion of the Young Talent Sessions at his Erice schools, and pioneered together with his co-Editors-in-Chief the introduction of “scientific notes” as article type for experimental groups to bridge the gap between the final years of LEP and the uptake of LHC operations.
Luisa Cifarelli & Dieter Haidt
EPJ Plus Highlight - Image processing brings new clarity to RTe3’s electronic structure
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- Published on 05 March 2026
By applying image segmentation to ARPES data, researchers reconcile Fermi surface measurements with magnetic quantum oscillations and precisely determine the size of tiny electron pockets in rare-earth tritellurides.
Rare-earth tritellurides (RTe₃) are a class of two-dimensional quantum materials known for their diverse electronic properties. One of the most powerful tools for studying them is angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), which probes the allowed energies and momenta of electrons in solids. Despite its strengths, conventional ARPES methods are not well suited to producing fully accurate two-dimensional momentum maps, limiting researchers’ view of the complex electronic landscape these materials host.
In new research published in EPJ Plus, a team led by Alexander Morocho and supervised by Prof. Pavel D. Grigoriev at the National University of Science and Technology (MISiS), Moscow, demonstrates how this limitation can be overcome through careful image processing of ARPES data combined with comparisons to magnetic quantum oscillations. Their results could help physicists better understand the origins of exotic quantum effects in RTe₃ compounds, possibly paving the way for new applications.
Subcategories
Topical Collections
Open calls for papers
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EPJ AM Call for papers: Themed Issue on Global Advances in Electromagnetic Metasurfaces for Space
(EPJ AM)
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Call for papers : Special Issue on Imaging, Diffraction, and Spectroscopy on the micro/nanoscale
(EPJ AP)
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EPJ C Topical Collection on String theory predictions for astroparticle and collider physics, and beyond
(EPJ C)
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EPJE Topical issue : The European Physical Journal E 25th Anniversary Collection: Past Insights, Present Voices, Future Horizons
(EPJ E)
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EPJ Plus Focus Point: Marine Citizen Science – Applications, Processes, and Data Integration
(EPJ PLUS)