Roberto Battiston is the new President of the Italian Space Agency

The announcement of the appointment of professor Battiston as the new President of the Italian Space Agency was made yesterday evening, by the Italian Ministry for Education, University and Research and was welcomed with great satisfaction. The Rector, Daria de Pretis, commented the news highlighting that “This award for professor Battiston, an internationally renowned physicist who has recently joined the academic community of UniTrento, is very significant. The Italian Space Agency is one of the most authoritative and important scientific institutions of Italy. On behalf of UniTrento, I wish to congratulate professor Battiston for this result and I hope that this appointment will offer the opportunity to underline and further enhance the numerous research initiative carried out by the Department of Physics, at international level, and also to further strengthen the cooperation of the University of Trento with the Italian Space Agency and the National Institute of Nuclear Physics, through the TIFPA Centre”. The appointment was disclosed yesterday evening through a memo from the Ministry for Education, University and Research and then immediately republished by many national and local newspapers. Professor Battiston, appointed by the Minister for Education, University and Research, Stefania Giannini, replaces Enrico Saggese. Within the University of Trento, professor Battiston is the coordinator of TIPFA -Trento Institute for Fundamental Physics and Application - the Italian national Centre of INFN, specializing in physics of particles and the development of cutting edge technologies in the fields of sensors, space research, supercomputing and biomedicine. The TIPFA was opened at the University of Trento in 2013. The TIPFA results from the cooperation between the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN), the University of Trento, the Bruno Kessler Foundation and the Provincial agency for public healthcare and welfare. Professor Battiston had recently attracted the attention of the public for his coordination of an important research project, targeted to the creation of a tool to detect electrons to be installed on the Chinese satellite CSES - China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite - planned to be launched in 2016. This satellite aims at analyzing the variability of the electromagnetic environment around the Earth and at developing new methods for the monitoring of geophysical phenomena on a large scale, e.g. the earthquakes. The project was initiated by the Italian Space Agency and received a 2 million euro funding; one was awarded to the Department of Physics of the University of Trento and one to the TIPFA Centre of the INFN in Trento.