Prof. Michał Tomczak elected as the new president of the Polish Astronomical Society
Prof. Michał Tomczak from the University of Wrocław’s Institute of Astronomy was elected the new president of the Polish Astronomical Society.
The PTA consists of professional astronomers. It has about 300 members, and while its function is to represent the Polish astronomical society, it also includes members from other countries.
New authorities of the organisation have been elected during the 42nd General Assembly of PTA which took place in Warsaw. Prof. dr hab. Michał Tomczak will preside over the Polish Astronomical Society for the next four years, as he was elected to be the successor of prof. Marek Sarna.
Michał Tomczak, born in 1960, studied astronomy at the University of Wrocław, where he graduated with a doctoral degree in 1994 under the guidance of his thesis advisor, dr hab. Jerzy Jakimiec. Tomczak earned the title of dr hab. in 2001, thanks to his series of works regarding characteristic morphological traits of solar flares within the X-ray spectrum. In 2012, he became a professor of physical sciences, specialising in astronomy.
From 2002 to 2020, he was the director of the University of Wrocław’s Institute of Astronomy. He was also an expert and a member of advisory panels of universities, ministries and the Polish Academy of Sciences. Since 2020, he has worked as the Dean of the Faculty of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Wrocław.
Dr hab. Michał Tomczak’s area of research is mostly focused on heliophysics, especially phenomena relating to the Sun’s magnetic activity. Additionally, he is also interested in matters such as space weather and the history of astronomy. He is the author of about 70 research papers, which have been cited over 600 times; he was a thesis advisor to 7 master’s degree students and 2 doctoral students in astronomy.
The newly elected president of the PTA is a coeditor of the recently published “Słownik biograficzny astronomów polskich” (eng. “Biographical Dictionary of Polish Astronomers”). Out of materials about the history of astronomy, he edited Eugeniusz Rybka’s “Kronika mojego życia.”
Other new members of the executive board of the Polish Astronomical Society include dr Krzysztof Czart (“Urania – Postępy Astronomii”), dr Piotr Kołaczek-Szymański from the UWr Institute of Astronomy and dr Paweł Zieliński from Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń’s Institute of Astronomy, prof dr hab. Katarzyna Małek from the National Centre for Nuclear Research, dr hab. Joanna Molenda-Żakowicz from the UWr Institute of Astronomy and dr Milena Ratajczak from the Astronomical Observatory of the University of Warsaw.
The Polish Astronomical Society was established over 100 years ago in 1923. Apart from being a scientific society, it also aims to popularise astronomy by, for example, publishing the bimonthly journal “Urania – Postępy Astronomii”, maintaining a website (www.urania.edu.pl), or by executing a series of television programmes, “Astronarium.”
Translated by Aleksandra Wysoczańska (student of English Studies at the University of Wrocław) as part of the translation practice.
Source: naukawpolsce.pl
Date of publication: 15.09.2025.
Added by: M. J.
