The website for the 14th EPS YM Leadership Meeting 2026 will be available soon, thanks to the efforts of the Vilnius Section.
You are welcome to attend the meeting on 15-16 May 2026, at the Faculty of Physics, Vilnius, Lithuania
The 13th EPS Young Minds Leadership Meeting was held in Santiago de Compostela, Spain on the 5th and 6th of June 2025. One of the most enriching experiences in our scientific careers is the opportunity to attend international conferences: meeting new peers to discuss science, work on future
collaborations, and in many cases, go sightseeing and have fun…Read more
The 14th EPS YM Leadership Meeting will take place at the Faculty of Physics in Vilnius, Lithuania, on 15–16 May 2026. The event website will be available soon, thanks to the collaboration of the Vilnius Section. Each Section Representative is invited to attend. Online registration is mandatory.
We are grateful to our sponsors for their generous support.
The 13th EPS Young Minds Leadership Meeting took place in Santiago de Compostela, Spain on the 5th and 6th of June, 2025.
Website of the meeting
Monday 25th of March was the first day of the Young Minds (YM) Leadership Meeting (LM) at the EPS Forum 2024. More than 70 participants from the YM network, representing 39 YM sections, as well as guests from other associations, were welcomed by the LM organization committee chair Anna Grigoryan, the EPS Secretary General Anne Pawsey and EPS Former Chair Luc Berge. EPS YM former chair Mattia Ostinato presented an overview of the YM program and the new elected YM chair Carmen Martín Valderrama was presented to the participants. Following two masterclasses on scientific writing given by the EDP Science Senior publisher Isabelle Auffret-Babak and Publishing Director Anne Ruimy, the participants attended the lecture given by Antigone Marino on Impostor Syndrome. Could not be missing the “From PhD to CEO” panel discussion, always inspiring, in collaboration with OPTICA.
Tuesday 26th of March, the day started with the Nobel Prize Laureates’ Lectures. The opportunity to attend such interesting sessions was allowed by the co-location with the EPS Forum. The morning continued with lecturer Tatevik Chalyan on writing a successful grant application, after which Steven Goldfarb presented the talk “Why we bother – the urgency of education and outreach”. To further connect with other YM delegates, a networking session was conducted and the day and LM were concluded with the YM activity poster session and the corresponding “Young Minds Best activity award by EPL” ceremony where the YM sections PONYS and SPAM Caserta received the winners certificates from EPL and 250 euros.
The meeting brought together YM delegates from 20 different countries, as well as many interested students and young researchers from outside of the YM network, making it a great success. Beyond the programme of the LM, the participants could learn about industrial opportunities and attend lectures from world-class researchers conducted in the EPS Forum. Thanks to the European Physical Society and Luc Bergé for the invitation and this opportunity and congratulations to the organization for the success of the event.
We believe that scientific outreach, cultural exchange and mutual understanding, and peaceful international collaboration are more important than ever and we believe that bringing young scientists together and equipping them with tools and skills is a great way of fostering these aspects.
We are very excited that so many young minds gathered for the meeting, and we are very much looking forward to the Leadership Meeting in 2025.
The Action Committee is currently looking for a number of motivated Young Minds to join its ranks.
The Action Committee manages the programme, from running short-term tasks like approving or rejecting grant applications, to defining strategic long-term goals for future development. As the YM project and network continue to grow, and fresh ideas are always welcome, we are looking for motivated people keen to contribute to the programme’s future development and join the committee.
If you are interested, please send an email to ac@epsyoungminds.org with a one-page (maximum) application stating your motivation, your experience within the project and other experiences you believe are relevant. Long-standing cooperation within Young Minds is not mandatory, but highly appreciated.
The deadline for applications is July 15th. We expect to send out notifications early in September.
Update: The deadline for applications has been extended to July 31st.
Finally, please do not hesitate to come back to us if there are any questions.
Last year’s Leadership Meeting was a fresh experience for Young Minds as a joint event with the brand-new EPS Forum in Paris. This year we go back to the usual format of a standalone event, this time in Italy.
The location of the meeting is Naples, hosted by PONYS – Naples Young Minds (Physics and Optics Naples Young Students). The dates are the 19th and 20th of May. You can find all the details on the website of the event.
As you may already know EPS Young Minds covers the accommodation and up to 100€ of the flight fare of one representative per section. Please, register before the deadline to secure the funding for your transport and stay.
Registration for the 11th Leadership Meeting is open starting now. Follow the link to register before the 3rd of March.
During the course of the EPS Forum 2022 the Action Committee gathered for its biannual meeting, discussed recent developments of the YM Programme and sketched plans for future activities.
Further, a successor for the current chair Richard Zeltner was elected: Mattia Ostinato, PhD student at the University of Barcelona and former member of the YM section in Naples, received the support of the full committee and will take over the chair position from July 1.
We thank Richard for his dedicated work and #leadership in the last two years, and we wish Mattia all the best and much success for his tenure.
Further, Daryna Pesina and Hripsime Mkrtchyan announced that they will leave the committee. We thank them for their valuable work and their commitment, and we wish them all the best for their future.
The 2022 Young Minds Leadership Meeting took place from June 2 to June 3 at the EPS Forum 2022 at Sorbonne University in Paris. On June 2 more than 40 delegates from the YM network, as well as guest from IAPS, were welcomed by the LM organization committee chair Mattia Ostinato and EPS YM Chair Richard Zeltner. Following a networking event, the participants attended the various industrial sessions of the EPS Forum, learning about the career opportunities for scientists outside of academia. In the afternoon Jean-François Morizur gave an inspiring “From PhD to CEO” workshop, that was moderated by Yann Amouroux from the European office of Optica.
On June 3 the LM concluded with inspiring talks from Prof. Petra Rudolf and Giuliana Galati, and the YM Poster Session in which the section delegates shared their recent activities with the rest of the YM network. After three years of virtual engagement the meeting brought together YM delegates from 20 different countries, as well as many interested students and young researchers from outside of the YM network, making it a great success. Beyond the programme of the LM, the co-location with the EPS Forum allowed the participants to learn about industrial opportunities and to attend lectures from world-class researchers, including 3 Nobel Laureates. Thanks to the European Physical Society and its president Luc Bergé for the invitation and this opportunity and congratulations to the organization for the success of the event.
We believe that scientific outreach, cultural exchange and mutual understanding, and peaceful international collaboration are more important than ever, and we believe that bringing young scientists together and equipping them with tools and skills is a great way of fostering these aspects. This said, we are very happy that so many young minds gathered for the meeting, and we are very much looking forward to the Leadership Meeting in 2023.
Many bright and committed Young Minds have followed the call for applications to join the Action Committee.
Eventually Dr. Mažena Mackoit Sinkevičienė (EPS YM Vilnius& postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Theoretical Physics and Astronomy, Vilnius University), Anna Grigoryan (EPS YM Artsakh & junior researcher at the A. Alikhanyan National Laboratory) and Carlos Damián Rodríguez-Fernández (EPS YM Santiago de Compostela & predoctoral researcher at the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela) were selected to join the committee.
All three have displayed great motivation and leadership in the development of their local sections and broader communities, and we are happy that they will contribute to the development of the programme in a more central role in the future.
Anna and Mažena already started their work in the committee, Carlos Damian will join after the summer break.
The Action Committee is currently looking for a number of motivated Young Minds to join its ranks.
The Action Committee manages the programme, from running short-term tasks like approving or rejecting grant applications, to defining strategic long-term goals for the future development. With the YM network continiously growing and 2022 hopefully bringing back more physical interaction, we are looking for motivated people keen to contribute to the future development of the programme and to bring in new ideas.
If you are interested, please send an email to ac@epsyoungminds.org with a one-page (maximum) application stating your motivation, your experience within the project and other experiences you believe are relevant. Long-standing cooperation within Young Minds is not mandatory, but highly appreciated.
The deadline for applications is December 12. We expect to send out notifications early in February 2022 latest.
Strongly aligned with the agenda of the current EPS presidency to strenghten the relations and the exchange between the EPS and business, EPS Young Minds is delighted to announce the next session of “From PhD to CEO”, the joint webinar series on young entrepreneurship in the European photonics community, jointly hosted by EPS YM and Optica.
In the session on October 28 Michele Lacerenza will share the story of PIONIRS. This young and innovative company is based in Milano, Italy, and is working towards developing next generation devices for near infrared spectroscopy in biomedical applications. More details on Michele and the mission of can be found in the flyer below.
As in previous editions registration is possible via the Optica website
