^1st International Symposium

“From Democritus to CERN”

From the “BEING” to the “Non-BEING” and from the ” MATTER” to the “Anti-MATTER “

UNESCO Chair Con-E- Ect, which is hosted in the Technological Educational Institute
of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace (EMATTECH), in collaboration with the
Municipality of Avdera and CERN, on the occasion of the great Greek philosopher
Democritus, are organizing the 1 st International Symposium under the topic: “From
Demokritos to CERN”. From the “BEING” to the “Non-BEING” and from the
“MATTER” to the “Anti-MATTER”

Few words for Democritus…

Democritus was born in the town of Avdera, Greece, in 460 B.C.E. comprising one of
the most important philosophers during the ancient times. He was the first one who
invented the atomic theory by configuring and extending it in the totality of natural
phenomena. Thus, he entrenched the theory by the most scientific way and
therefore opened the gates to the Natural Sciences. More specifically, Democritus
believed that the matter was comprised by unbroken, invisible elements which were
called “atoms” and the vacuum space was not identical to the nothing (“non-Being”)
but it was something real. The atomic theory, as it was expressed by Democritus, is
of particular interest, as it affected to a great extent the modern view. It is not by
chance that the Democritus’ theory had been basically unchanged until the 19 th
century.
During the 1^st International Symposium of Avdera, an attempt is being made in order
to connect the birthplace of this great philosopher Democritus with CERN! Great
Greek and foreign eminent scientists and researchers from CERN as well as from
several International Educational Institutes, will present and develop subjects
relevant to the modern atomic theories while in the same time an experimental
training workshop will take place for the Secondary School students. After the
completion of the visit tour to the archaeological monuments, the Symposium
workshops will be concluded in the round table under the topic : “ From the first
Symposium into consolidating a constant collaboration with CERN : road map
towards establishing annual events devoted to CERN-Avdera collaboration”. Main
goal of the Symposium is the signing of a memorandum in order to assure the
continuation of the institution annually.

The detailed agenda of the Symposium as follows:

17 th of May 2018
1st Day of Works

Venue: Conference Hall, Archeological Museum of Avdera

9:00-9.30 Registration of Participants

9.30-10.00 Welcoming Speeches

10:00 – 10:30 Prof. D.Bandekas, Rector of EMaTTEch and Principal investigator of GRID Lab

Theme: to be defined

10:30-11.00 Εvangelos Gazis, Professor of Particle Physics, NTU-Athens,
Director of the High Energy Physics & Related Technology Laboratory,
Coordinator of the Greek research teams in ATLAS and CLIC experiments
at CERN,
“The novel accelerator development, after the Higgs Boson era,
provides the Engines of the Future”

11.00-11.30 Coffee break

11.30-12.00 Pantelis Botsaris, Professor in Production Engineering and
Management, Democritus University of Thrace, School of Engineering,
Dep. of Production Eng. Deputy rector in Research and Innovation,
Democritus University of Thrace.
“From Scientific Revolution to modern economy”

12.00-12.30 Maurizio Bona, Dr. in material science, CERN Senior Advisor for
relations with Parliaments and Science for policy, and Senior Advisor on
knowledge transfer.
CERN: sixty years of science for peace and development
CERN’s advocacy for science in the international community 

12.30-13.00 Maria Rentetzi, Associate Professor in Science History, Applied
Mathematics Department, National Technical University of Athens
"What a Queen is Doing at CERN? Science Diplomacy in the early
1960s”

13.00-13.30 Marco Battaglia, Professorin Experimental Particle Physics, at University of California at Santa Cruz.

“The Dark Matter in the Universe and the Higgs Boson” 

13.30-14.00 Discussion

14.00-15.00 Lunch break

18 th of May 2018
2nd Day of Works

Venue: Conference Hall, Archeological Museum of Avdera

9:00 - 9:30 Welcoming Speech,

Prof. Demetrios Emmanouloudis, Chair holder, UNESCO Chair

Con-E- Ect,

9:30 – 10:00 N. Vordos, Researcher, Representative of GRID Lab, EMaTTech
“From Macro towards the Nano scale. The engineering in
Medicine”

10:00-10:45 Andriana Paraskevopoulou, Journalist ERT1
«CERN: The secrets of the Universe»
Video for Lyceum students
Parallel activity: Archeological tour guide (speakers only)

10.45-11.15 Coffee Break

11.15-11.30 Εvangelos Gazis, Professor of Particle Physics, NTU-Athens,
Director of the High Energy Physics & Related Technology Laboratory,
Coordinator of the Greek research teams in ATLAS and CLIC
experiments at CERN:
Introduction to the Experimental workshop

11.30-13.00 Educational Video Projection

Experimental workshop, addressed to secondary school
students

Facilitators/instructors:

•     Maria Kainourgiaki, Electrical Engineer& Computer Engineer,
      National Technical University of Athens
•     Katerina Tzanetou: Applied Physics-
      National Technical University of Athens

13.00-14.00 Round Table: “From the 1 st Symposium in to consolidating a
constant collaboration with CERN: road map towards
establishing annual events devoted to CERN - Avdera