Hungarian Academy of Sciences: Supporting women’s advancement through targeted grants

Although quantum electrodynamics is considered a well-established theory in physics, in chemistry – in the world of atoms and molecules – it still raises a number of unresolved questions. Edit Mátyus, Doctor of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Professor in the Department of Physical Chemistry at Eötvös Loránd University, and head of the Molecular Quantum Electrodynamics Research Group, and her colleagues are attempting to answer these questions with the support of the Momentum Programme.

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Often, the simplest models are needed to understand the most complex laws of nature. This is especially true for interacting electron systems, about which we still know relatively little today because, until now, we have not had access to sufficiently simple model crystals. Despite this, Péter Nemes-Incze, head of the Momentum Topology in Nanostructures Research Group at the Institute of Technical Physics and Materials Science of the HUN–REN Centre for Energy Research, and his colleagues believe that this model could be rhombohedral graphite, which they are investigating with the support of their Momentum grant.

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A wide-ranging discussion on topics such as academic freedom, AI in science policy, integrity and transparency, and working with policymakers took place at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) at its 200th anniversary celebration and international conference in Budapest on 4 November. The day’s workshop was organised by Science Advice for Policy by European Academies (SAPEA) and co-organised with All European Academies (ALLEA) and MTA.

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Nowadays, telecommunications providers and IT companies collect vast amounts of electronic data about us. These databases may contain sensitive personal data, which means they also carry risks, but at the same time they can be an incredibly valuable source of information for the social sciences. Balázs Lengyel, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Economics of the HUN-REN Centre for Economic and Regional Studies, and his colleagues are analysing some of this data with the support of the Momentum (Lendület) Programme. The researcher has won a Momentum grant for the second time – now in the advanced category – and is currently researching innovation and inequality in dynamic urban networks.

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At a time when trust in expertise faces growing pressure, Professor Barbara Prainsack, political scientist and Chair of the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies, called for a renewed understanding of integrity in science advice for policy. She spoke at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) at its 200th anniversary celebration and international conference in Budapest on 4 November, serving as keynote speaker for the afternoon workshop titled “Upholding Integrity in Scientific Advice: Key Principles and Challenges”.

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Europe’s research landscape strives for unity – yet divides between regions remain evident. Professor Pawel Rowinski, President of ALLEA (the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities) and Director of the Institute of Geophysics of the Polish Academy of Sciences, sat down with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) at its 200th anniversary celebration and international conference in Budapest on 4 November to discuss this topic. The professor highlighted for us how openness, inclusiveness and long-term investment can make the European Research Area truly cohesive.

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The Hungarian Academy of Sciences is celebrating its 200th anniversary. The third day of November marked the beginning of several days of bicentennial programmes in Hungary’s capital, where leaders from numerous scientific academies and scientific organisations around the world gathered to help MTA celebrate. As part of the celebrations, an international conference was held on 4 November entitled The Past, Present and Future of Learned Societies: The Changing Role of Academies in the 21st Century.

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Professor Wim van Saarloos, physicist and former president of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, has long grappled with how to make scientific advice more effective. The professor sat down with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) at its 200th anniversary celebration and international conference in Budapest on 4 November to discuss this and other topics relevant to European science policy today. As President of the European Academies Science Advisory Council (EASAC), he emphasised that bridging the gap between research and political decision-making requires foresight, focus and constant adaptation.

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How did an institution of such defining importance for the Hungarian language, culture, identity, and science — the Academy — come into being in a city where most people spoke German and there were no Hungarian-language cultural institutions? How has its history unfolded over the past two centuries, in parallel with that of the nation itself? At the ceremonial General Assembly, a short film titled “The Harbor of Our National Existence” was presented, produced by the animation studio Animatiqua. The creators used rarely seen historical photographs, brought to life with the help of artificial intelligence.

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The Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) symposium “From Barriers to Bridges: Towards a More Cohesive European Research Area” saw a high-level dialogue organised by Academia Europaea Budapest Hub on 5 November 2025.

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This year, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) celebrates the 200th anniversary of its founding with a series of events, including the opening of its Sunshine after Rain (Borúra derű) exhibition at the Academy’s grand neo-Renaissance headquarters (Palace) in Budapest.

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Between 3-5 November 2025, high-level international events took place in Budapest as part of the 200th anniversary celebrations of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA). Presidents of partner academies and organisations, heads of scientific councils and science policy experts came together to commemorate this significant anniversary. As part of the three-day-long international celebratory events, two signing ceremonies of cooperation agreements and a number of high-level bilateral meetings took place.

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The year 2025 marks a special year in the history of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences: this year MTA celebrates the 200th anniversary of its foundation. Two hundred years ago, on 3 November 1825, Count István Széchenyi offered one year’s income of his estates for the purposes of establishing a Hungarian Learned Society.

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With the support of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences’ Momentum Programme, Péter Biró, who founded his second Momentum research group in 2022, also participated in the development of a software tool called KEPsoft, which has won an Innovation Award from the European Association of Research and Technology Organisations (EARTO). The achievements of these dynamic researchers illustrate the wide-ranging innovation potential for those involved in social science research.

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Composer, pianist, conductor, musical leader and one of the most important figures in 20th-century Hungarian music history, Ernő Dohnányi (1877-1960) is the subject of a richly detailed portrait and previously unpublished documents in a volume compiled by James A. Grymes and Veronika Kusz, published by Oxford University Press entitled The Last Romantic in His Own Words: Ernst von Dohnányi’s Selected Writings and Interviews. The book is based on Dohnányi’s American bequest, which has been in the possession of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences since 2015 and is currently held by the ELTE RCH Institute for Musicology, Archives for 20th-21st Century Hungarian Music. We spoke to Veronika Kusz, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute and one of the authors of the work.

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Réka Lukács, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Geological and Geochemical Research of the HUN-REN Research Centre for Astronomy and Earth Sciences is researching fundamental questions in volcanology with her team, with the support of the Momentum Programme. In addition to its scientific value, their research also has important practical and even disaster management implications, as hundreds of millions of people around the world live near dangerous volcanoes. It is therefore vital that we understand the workings of volcanoes as well as possible, so that our predictive models can become increasingly accurate.

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Coordinated by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, the Momentum MSCA Premium Postdoctoral Fellowship Programme aims to provide outstanding international researchers with the opportunity to carry out independent research projects by joining existing Momentum research groups. Through this initiative, the programme contributes to strengthening both scientific excellence in Hungary and international research cooperation.

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Who are the Nobel Prize winners researchers who are connected to Hungary by Hungarian birth or Hungarian origin? György Bazsa, Doctor of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and Professor Emeritus of the University of Debrecen, seeks to answer this question in his article. The aim of his compilation was to provide an overview of the important information available on the subject.

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Sir Partha Dasgupta, who is known worldwide as the author of The Economics of Biodiversity, gave a lecture at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA). After his lecture, the Indian-born British economist took part in a roundtable discussion with ecologist András Báldi, a corresponding member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. MTA asked Báldi about the guest speaker and the report.

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At its meeting of 24 June 2025, the Presidium of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences unanimously adopted the following resolution on the dissolution of the HUN-REN Hungarian Research Network.

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