Awards

The 2026 Medal of the Royal Spanish Physical Society  has been awarded to Jairo Sinova,  for his fundamental role in the conceptual development of altermagnetism, which extends the classification of materials according to their magnetic order, and his transformational contributions to the field of spintronics.

 

The jury emphasizes that this discovery has opened up a new field of research with promising applications in the development of more efficient magnetic memories.

The Medal has been awarded since 1958 and since 2008 it has been supported by the BBVA Foundation. The award recognizes a Spanish physicist who has distinguished themselves extraodinarily in research in physics, and only one medal is awarded each year.

Full link to the announcement at the BBVA Foundation: https://www.fbbva.es/noticias/fallados-premios-fisica-rsef-fundacion-bbva-2026/

The 2026 Europhysics Prize of the EPS Condensed Matter Division is awarded to Dr. Libor Šmejkal, Prof. Jairo Sinova, and Prof. Tomas Jungwirth for the discovery of altermagnetism, a third elementary magnetic class that combines ferromagnetic-like and antiferromagnetic-like characteristics considered for a century as mutually exclusive, and characteristics unprecedented in either of the two conventional magnetic classes.

The Prize will be presented on Tuesday September 22^nd 2026, during the Awards Session of the 32^nd General Conference of the EPS Condensed Matter Division (CMD32), in Graz organised jointly with the Austrian Physical Society. The Europhysics Prize has been awarded since 1975 (this is the 42^nd edition) and is one of Europe’s most prestigious prizes in the field of condensed matter physics. It is awarded in recognition of a prominent and well-identifiable discovery, breakthrough, or contribution to condensed matter physics, by one or more individuals, a contribution that, in the opinion of the selection committee, represents scientific excellence. The award recognizes research for which a significant portion of the work was carried out in Europe. A summary of all the prize editions can be found here.

We are proudly announcing that Pieter Gunnink has been awarded an individual fellowship provided through the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions program, which supports the Mainz physicist to carry out a new research project in the field of spintronics. Please read the original press statement here.