Foreword

Full text: Institutes, which are not intimately coupled to higher education, can crudely be divided into two groups: those which concentrate on the fundamental research in a particular discipline of science and those involved in the R and D phase, associated with a particular field of application. A balanced mix of the two is rare, so rare in fact, that if such an unorthodox organization is set, it has hard time in adapting to the rules of financing. The same difficulty applies to cross-disciplinary hybrids. And all that in spite of the lip service of various decision-taking bodies that it is the cross-disciplinary harmonious transfer of ideas-to-research-to-development-to production which is the ultimate objective of their policies. Our institute has the mixed fortune of being such a mix of basic research, of multidisciplinary research and development and even of production of some end products. We take pride in doing so in a relatively harmonious way on a satisfactory level. But we also take heavy beating because we do not fit to the schematic rules of financing. Yet we are convinced that this way of doing research in non-educational scientific institutions is right, that in the long run it is the most efficient one and that if the rules limit this efficiency, it is the rules which ought to be changed. However up-hill struggle that is !. The Readers of this Report are invited to take a look at this mixture of ours. They can begin with e.g. the account of the work concerning testing the Standard Model, searching for the Higgs boson or for the supersymmetric particles - the front line in the elementary particle physics of the day. Or with the preparations for the presumable front line of to-morrow the new projects at the LHC (Large Hadron Collider). The technology pull that these projects exert is difficult to measure and likewise difficult to overestimate. Leaving the accelerator-produced particles and going to still higher energies, we learn about the cosmic rays in the ''knee region'' (1015 - 1017) eV from the cosmic showers (the KASCADE collaboration) or inquire the Nature about the possible correlation of some cosmic radiation with the solar activity. One front-line in the low energy nuclear physics nowadays is the quest for the heaviest nuclear species - one of the specialities of our theory group. This group is known for its close contacts with experimentalists around the world. Recently, they highlighted these contacts by suggesting a new method to improve the mass determination for heavy nuclides from the Schottky noise signals in a storage ring. We move on to the plasma physics. The physics of the fourth state of matter, dominating in the Universe, the physics of non-linear phenomena, the physics of the XXI century. The physics closely linked to nuclear sciences and yet distinctly different. The physics which has numerous technological spin-offs, be it because of the experimental techniques it develops or of the phenomena it discovers. It is good to see that we are strongly entrenched in this field and have justified appetites for more. We focus now on the materials science done with nuclear techniques. We are pleased to note that our implantation techniques develop well and are now applied to e.g. hardening the steel edges. And we brag a bit about our latest work on the new crystallographic forms of uranium compounds after having done experiments we now propose explanations. The experimental physicist needs detectors. Ever better, bigger, more sophisticated. We have a strong group pursuing this improvement task, especially with respect to the scintillators. It was rewarding to learn that the international community has appreciated this effort. The appreciation came from the IEEE/Nuclear and Plasma Science Society with the award of their prestigious prize ''to Marek Moszynski for outstanding contributions to the modern scintillation detector and its application in physics experiment, nuclear medicine and other fields of use''. Almost any development in experimental techniques of nuclear physics results very quickly in new techniques in medicine, in the diagnostics as well as in therapy. Our miniature X-ray tube for brachytherapy, nick-named ''the photon needle'', gained a nomination for the prestigious ''Polish product of the future'' award. We hope that it will soon become a useful tool in the hands of physicians. The traditional line of our medical applications is the development and production of linear electron accelerators for tumor therapy. Our 10 MeV ''Neptun'' accelerator has got a significant face-lifting this year and the construction of a new 6-to-15 MeV machine is well advanced. We hope this will meet the needs of our customers in Poland and abroad. Last but not least I'd like to mention the quickly increasing flow of people passing the premises of our Training Department. The number of school students visiting us last year reached unprecedented level of 2500, there were also courses and trainings for various professionals. We consider this activity as an additional but important way of paying back ''the tax-payer'' for the support we are getting and also as our contribution to fight ''the anti-nuclear fobia''. (author)