Workshop on hadron therapy, space research and materials science held in Greece

Motivated by the wish to enhance awareness on benefits for society from fundamental research and to facilitate progress and future developments, a few days workshop and public events on “Ions for cancer therapy, space research and material science” took place, for the first time, this summer in Chania, Crete, Greece.

The scientific workshop, 28-30 august, focusing this year on cancer therapy, was preceded by a weekend of public events, 26-28 August, and concluded by an open discussion with the general public. These events, hosted in the heart of the old harbour of Chania, brought out the message that despite the fact that the main aim of large research institutes, such as GSI and CERN, is fundamental research, important spin-offs have a direct impact on every-day’s life, highlighting in particular hadron therapy.

The workshop provided an overview of the current state of the art and future developments in particle therapy of cancer as detailed in the CERN Courier article and was characterized by a multidisciplinary aspect “reaching out” towards different scientific communities of different expertise.

Presentations of the current status of innovations and their implementation in therapy centres were followed by details on the state-of-the-art existing centres and future projects in Europe, Russia and US. The strong contributions and expertise of GSI were apparent and triggered interesting discussions and ideas. A lot has been achieved since pioneering ion therapy at GSI, and the challenges ahead are many pointing to the necessity for strong cooperation.

The discussions extended on related applications for space research and dosimetry including developments of detectors and techniques, routinely used for physics research. With the wish to bring local universities in closer contact with international organizations planning new facilities, a special session was hosted at the technical university of Crete highlighting their research activities with emphasis on “science for health”.

The benefits of strong cooperation and best use of expertise and resources were also repeatedly brought up during the reports of the future BIOMAT projects planned at GSI/FAIR and JINR for biophysics and materials research.

Dedicated time for discussion addressed a concise set of items also including practical issues spanning from availability of beam time at different facilities to more effectively sharing results and information. Overall, the clear need emerged for a multi-ion research facility in parallel with new compact single-ion accelerator designs for treatment.

An equally important topic of concern for future progress, the need of properly trained personnel, was also addressed and special emphasis was given to communication to educators and students at all levels. The public events and the workshop, were open to all interested students and teachers from Crete and supported by the rector of the university and directors of education through professional official channels.

The tight scientific programme was paralleled by numerous social events highlighting the culture of the area and the warm hospitality of the local communities.

The workshop’s some fifty participants, mostly a team of experts of different disciplines individually invited, appreciated the format of the workshop and recognized that synergies and “reaching out” towards scientific communities of different expertise can boost future advances. Overall the workshop further facilitated flow of information and strengthened cooperation on relevant activities in the large research centers with valuable input from existing therapy centers and proposals for future projects.

Y. Foka, CERN

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