The Special Issue Phase Transitions vol. 89 will be dedicated to honor the life-long scientific achievements of Professor Bożena Hilczer.
PHASE TRANSITIONS, 2016
VOL. 89, NOS. 7-8, 643-644 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01411594.2016.1208408
EDITORIAL
It is a great pleasure to dedicate this volume of Phase Transitions to our distinguished mentor, colleague and friend Bożena Hilczer on her 80th birthday. Her active research work and production of ideas have not stopped even after almost 60 years of professional life. Below is described how it began and evolved.
Bożena Hilczer was born in 1936 in Bydgoszcz, Poland, and finished her study in physics (MSc degree) at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań in 1958. In the same year she started her research as an assistant in the Poznań branch of the Institute of Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS). In 1965, she received her PhD degree and became a head of the Ferroelectrics Department. In 1974, she received habilitation in Solid State Physics from the Institute of Physics, PAS in Warsaw; and in 1975 became an assistant professor at the Institute of Molecular Physics in Poznań, an autonomous division of the PAS. While working there she received a full professor title in 1981. She formally retired in 2011 and has been working as Professor Emeritus since 2012.
The title of this issue is related to Bożena’s preferred fields of expertise. Some of these are: (1) Influence of various kinds of defects on the ferroelectric properties (effect of X, g, fast neutron irra- diation and doping; radiation-induced phase transitions; critical behavior). (2) Charge storage in dielectrics (electrets; piezopolymers; ferroelectric polymers). (3) Dynamics of ferroelectric and fer- roelastic structures. (4) Superprotonic phase transitions in MHXO4, M3H(XO4)2, A4H2(XO4)3 groups of crystals (A D Rb, Cs, NH4, X D S, Se; effect of local structure and its dynamics). (5) Effect of conformational and structural disorder on the properties of polymer relaxors. (6) Dielectric and pyroelectric response of electroactive ceramic-polymer nanocomposites. (7) Electric transport in proton conductors of various structures. (8) Size effects in single phase multiferroics.
The didactic activity of Bożena Hilczer includes monographic courses on the Influence of Lattice Defects on the Properties of Ferroelectrics, Physics of Dielectrics, Smart Materials, Modern Sensors and Actuators, which she provided in Japan (Tokyo), Egypt (Alexandria) and Poland between 1985 and 2000. She was also a supervisor of more than 30 MScs 9 PhDs in physics. In addition, Bożena is a patent holder for Technology of Diaphragms for Electret Microphones and a co-author of Tech- nology of Pyroelectric Detectors Based on Piezopolymers.
Bożena was, and in some cases still is, active in professional societies and boards. For many years she was a member of scientific councils of research institutes and scientific committees in Poland and a member of International Advisory Boards: the European Meetings on Ferroelectricity (1975-2007), of the International Meetings on Ferroelectricity (1977-2009), the European Confer- ence on Application of Polar Dielectrics (from the beginning to 2013), the International Symposium on Ferroic Domains and Mesoscopic Structures (from the beginning to 2002) and the International Symposium on Electrets (1993-2015). She remains an active member of the Editorial Boards of Fer- roelectrics and Ferroelectrics Letters.
Throughout her scientific career, which was closely connected with the development and prog- ress of Polish physics in the field of ferroelectricity, Bożena published more than 300 papers. In addition, she is co-author of three books (with Jerzy Małecki) and three chapters in books.
Bożena Hilczer was a head of the Ferroelectrics Department during the years of totalitarian rule, when traveling abroad was very difficult in Poland. We want to remind everyone that those were times when keeping contacts and, above all, traveling to non-socialist countries was subjected to approval from the Communist Party - a procedure of unpredictable result. Even then, due to her contacts and scientific activity, she was able to arrange postdoctoral stays in West European labora- tories for several researchers from the department. Her eminent scientific position meant that she was entrusted with the organization the Sixth European Meeting on Ferroelectricity, which took place in Poznań in 1987.
The difficulties in maintaining contacts with the Western World led, in a natural way, to a need for establishing regular bilateral contacts on the basis of common scientific interests. Since the 1960s the Hilczer’s group had a successful scientific collaboration with the Department of Ferroelectrics of the Institute of Physics, Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in Prague, headed by Jan Fousek. The meetings of the heads of the Departments resulted in the establishment of the series of Polish- Czechoslovak (now Polish-Czech and Czech-Polish, by turns) Seminars ‘Structural and Ferroelectric Phase Transitions’. The first Seminar took place in Błażejewko near Poznań. During that difficult time the Seminars were the only international scientific events in the field which could be attended by practically all researchers from both countries who wished to participate. In the early Seminars the number of participants in the annual (till 1984) and then biennial events varied between 50 and 60. After 1990 the Seminars opened to geographically unlimited attendance and the number of participants has gradually increased to more than 100 in the most recent events. The Seminars have for years been a platform for the presentation of new results and for unconstrained discussions on new trends in physics of ferroelectrics and related fields. The exceptional approach to the events, with their traditionally friendly atmosphere and strongly supportive scientific integration, allows those attending to initiate common research and establish friendships. In this photo Bożena Hilczer and Jan Fousek are most likely working out the details of the first Seminar.
The XXII Polish-Czech Seminar took place in Hucisko, South- ern Poland and was a tribute to Bożena Hilczer on the occasion of her 80th birthday. It was, as always, organized by collaborating researchers from the Institute of Molecular Physics, PAS, Poznań and the Institute of Physics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague. The 108 participants, 19 of whom were students, had many fruitful discussions that contributed to the success of the Seminar. Participants from 12 countries made the meeting truly international in scope. There were 9 plenary, 7 key and 25 regular lectures. In addition, 58 posters were presented. It is worth noting, that all the students had an oral or poster presentation. The scope was focused on recent achieve- ments in the field of ferroelectrics and related materials. The presented studies were devoted to relaxor ferroelectrics, multiferroics, improper ferroelectrics, structural phase transitions in superpro- tonic ferroelastics, ferro- and antiferroelectric liquid crystals, nanocomposites, and all of them were examined with a rich range of methods.
This issue incorporates parts of papers containing the results presented at the XXII Seminar as well as six papers delivered by invited eminent scientists from various countries, who did not partic- ipate in the Seminar.
Through this issue we want to pay a tribute to Bożena Hilczer and honor her for her long and prolific scientific life spanning almost six decades. We also want to thank Bożena for her lifetime of activity in the field of ferroelectricity and phase transitions, and for the knowledge she successfully passed on not only to the Polish, but also to the international ferroelectrics society.
Bartłomiej Andrzejewski, Antoni Pawłowski and Andrzej Hilczer
Department of Ferroelectrics, Institute of Molecular Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poznań, Poland
Jan Petzelt and Jiri Hlinka
Department of Dielectrics, Institute of Physics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic