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LATEST NEWS

December 2011, PROF CHILINGARIAN WAS ELECTED AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY FELLOW.

Prof. Ashot Chilingarian, the director of Yerevan Physics Institute and the head of its cosmic ray division is named and APS fellow this this year.

The APS announcement reads as follows: "Ashot Chilingarian, Yerevan Physics Insitute: For bringing one of the world's largest facilities for monitoring different species of secondary cosmic rays located in Armenia to the International Space Weather initiative as a global warning system from violent space events. Nominated by: Forum on International Physics"

Congratulations to Prof. Chilingarian!

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December 2011, Prof. Chilingarian Invited to Report on the Research on Aragats at the Annual American Geophysical Union Conference in San Francisco. Dr. Bagrad Mailyan also to Present His Work.
Because of the ground breaking research conducted on Mt. Aragats the American Geophysical Union Conference committee has invited Prof. Chilingarian, to report on CRD’s research. Accompanying Chilingarian will be Dr. Bagrad Mailyan, one of the young scientists who recently received his PhD while conducting his research at the Cosmic Ray Division. At this same conference, Dr. Mailyan will present his work on the energy spectra of the gamma rays and the electric fields which accelerate the electrons within thunderclouds.

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March 2011, The 24-th Solar Activity Cycle Produced the First Violent Blast. Aragats and SEVAN Monitors Took Excellent Data.
The sun unleashed its strongest solar flare in nearly five years on Feb 15 2011, sending a massive wave of charged particles toward Earth. The Coronal Mass Ejection (CME), a huge cloud of charged particles, reached the Earth in approximately 3 days and triggered a sizeable geomagnetic storm and a deep Forbush decrease (Fd). Fd is a rapid decrease in the observed galactic cosmicray intensity following a CME arrival. Variety of the particle detectors of the Aragats Space Environmental Center (ASEC) in Armenia and the Space Environmental Viewing and Analysis Network (SEVAN), a worldwide network, registered the Fd in all details.

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September 2010, the Thunderstorms and Elementary Particle Acceleration (TEPA-2010) conference was held from September 6 through 11, 2010 in the Nor Amberd international conference centre of Artem Alikhanyan National Laboratory (AANL), formerly known as Yerevan Physics Institute, in Armenia. The conference was organized by the Cosmic Ray Division (CRD) of AANL, Armenia and Skobeltsyn Institute of Nuclear Physics of Moscow State University, Russian Federation. The conference was sponsored by AANL, the international Committee On Space Research (COSPAR) and the Armenian State Science Committee. Forty scientists and students from USA, UK, Germany, Mexico, Russia and Armenia attended the conference

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September 2009, CRD Delegation at the Balkan, Black and Caspian Sea Regional conference on Heliophysical Phenomena and the Earth Environment.
On September 4-18, 2009 a delegation from the Yerevan Physics Institute (YerPhI) consisting of Prof. Ashot Chilingarian, YerPhi's director and head of its Cosmic Ray Division (CRD), with CRD scientists and engineers participated in the International conference on the Heliophysical Phenomena and the Earth Environment in Shibenik, Croatia. The regional meeting of Balkan, Black Sea, and Caspian Sea participants was held for the third time within the framework of the International Heliophysical Year, now being continued as the International Space Weather Initiative (ISWI). This initiative is supported by NASA and the United Nation's Outer Space Office in Vienna, Austria.

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The conference was organized by the Cosmic Ray Division (CRD) of AANL, Armenia and Skobeltsyn Institute of Nuclear Physics of Moscow State University, Russian Federation. The conference was sponsored by AANL, the international Committee On Space Research (COSPAR) and the Armenian State Science Committee. Forty scientists and students from USA, UK, Germany, Mexico, Russia and Armenia attended the conference

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September 2009, CRD Delegation at the Balkan, Black and Caspian Sea Regional conference on Heliophysical Phenomena and the Earth Environment.

On September 4-18, 2009 a delegation from the Yerevan Physics Institute (YerPhI) consisting of Prof. Ashot Chilingarian, YerPhi's director and head of its Cosmic Ray Division (CRD), with CRD scientists and engineers participated in the International conference on the Heliophysical Phenomena and the Earth Environment in Shibenik, Croatia. The regional meeting of Balkan, Black Sea, and Caspian Sea participants was held for the third time within the framework of the International Heliophysical Year, now being continued as the International Space Weather Initiative (ISWI). This initiative is supported by NASA and the United Nation's Outer Space Office in Vienna, Austria.

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December 2008, SEVAN Detectors Deployed in Bulgaria and Croatia

Construction of the SEVAN (Space Environmental Viewing and Analysis Network) network has started within the framework of the International Heliophysical Year and United Nations Basic Space Science (UNBSS) program focusing on deployment of arrays of small inexpensive instruments around the world. The Cosmic Ray Division of the Alikhanyan Physics Institute donates scintillators, photomultipliers and Data Acquisition electronics to donor countries. The first four SEVAN modules operated at Aragats Space Environmental Center in Armenia, at altitudes 1000, 17000, 2000 and 3200 m in Yerevan and on the slopes of mountain. Aragats. Installation of the first SEVAN detector abroad was performed by the group of CRD experts in December 2008 in Croatia and Bulgaria. The first test demonstrated the high reliability of SEVAN detectors operation.

These units will be deployed at the universities and research centers of developing countries to perform survey and monitoring of the most dangerous space storms and to involve new generations of students and scientists in space research.

A further step towards creating world-wide network will be the development of databases and on-line data flow from remote detectors for mutual analysis and issuing alerts and forecasting on upcoming space storms. The potential recipients of particle detectors in this new initiative are Croatia, Slovakia, Costa Rica, Bulgaria, Indonesia, and India. When fully deployed the SEVAN network will provide reliable monitoring of the Sun by at least one detector 24 hours and by two detectors 18 hours every day.

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September 2008, International Workshop “Forecasting of Radiation and Geomagnetic Storms by Networks of Particle Detectors” Held in Armenia

From September 29 to October 3 the Cosmic Ray Division (CRD) of the Alikhanyan Physics Institute hosted the International Astroparticle Physics Symposium “Forecasting of the Radiation and Geomagnetic Storms by Networks of Particle Detectors (FORGES-2008)” at CRD’s International Conference Center, Nor Amberd, Armenia. The focus of the Symposium was pointed on the Space Weather drivers and on possibilities of the networks of particle detectors measuring changing fluxes of neutral and charged particles to forewarn on upcoming severe radiation and geomagnetic storms. Radiation and geomagnetic storms can interfere with electronic systems on earth and damage satellites in space. Thus forecasting such events is extremely important.

The conference lasted a week. Approximately 40 scientists and students from Germany, Italy, Great Britain, Croatia, Greece, Ukraine, Russia, USA, Costa-Rica and Armenia attended the symposium. The conference met for six hours on each of the conference days, split into morning and afternoon sessions, with free time between the sessions for ongoing individual exchanges or outdoor activities.

The core activities of the conference were based on lectures by invited scientists, followed by 15 minute discussion periods. Participants listened to 8 invited lectures and 25 original Papers.

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September 2007, Lebedev-CRD International Cosmic Ray Workshop “ARAGATS-2007" Held in Nor-Amberd, Armenia

The International Cosmic Ray Workshop "ARAGATS-2007" organized by the Moscow Lebedev Physical Institute and the Yerevan Physics Institute was held September 9-13, 2007 in Nor-Amberd, Armenia. The Workshop focused on the cosmic ray and gamma ray data collection, analysis and interpretation relevant to the study of the knee energy region of the primary cosmic ray energy spectrum on data collected with the GAMMA and MAKET-ANI arrays on Mt. Aragats and other facilities located on mountain elevations as well as closer to sea level.

The numerous close discussions among the several research groups working in this area served an important ground on the way to resolving differences between them and aimed at better understanding of the knee origin. This Workshop was a logical successor to a very successful Workshop held in Kazakhstan at the Tien-Shan station in August, 2006.

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May 8 2007, SEVAN was named the Observatory of the Week, and Professor Chilingarian was named the Personality of the Week, in IHY07's weekly newsletter. The IHY07 article may be viewed at: http://http://ihy2007.org/newsroom/weekly_070508.shtml

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March 31 - April 3, 2007, CRD Hosted Workshop on Particle Networks for Space Weather Research

Rainer Hippler from Institut fuer Physik Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universitaet Greifswald, Germany Erwin Flueckiger from Bern University, Switzerland Lev Dorman and Lev Pustilnik from Israel Cosmic Ray & Space Weather Center and Emilio Segre Observatory, Israel participated in the workshop.

The workshop included: Meeting CRD electronics group members; demonstration of new electronics to be used in the project; discussions; Visit to Yerevan Physics Institute, CRD headquarters, electronics lab, Space education Center. Meeting with CRD students and their short presentations, as well as discussion on the possible participation in FP7 program and on the on-line integration of data from surface and space born facilities.

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March 25 2007, Armenian-Iranian pianist, Raphael Minaskanian, in Concert as a Tribute to the CRD in San Francisco

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September 2006, CRD's DVIN was the model project for UN's World Summit on Information Society.

The UN World Summit on Information Society website displayed CRD’s Data Visualization Interactive Network (DVIN) project as its high standard for others to follow. In the first WSIS competition in 2003, DVIN took first in the e-science category, out of 800 projects from 136 countries. As a result, the president of Armenia was asked to make the presentation of the awards to Prof. Chilingarian for Armenia , and the other three finalists from Canada , China , and US. The Award ceremony was in Geneva during the WSIS in the presence of 10,000 participants and many heads of state.

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March 2006, Armenia to Become the Full Member of the European COST 724 Action

Prof. Ashot Chilingarian represented CRD at the “Developing the scientific basis for monitoring and predicting Space Weather” meeting organized by the COST 724 managerial committee in Antalyа (Turkey) from March 27 to March 30. Armenia has been an associate member of the COST action since 2004. It was the first time that a country representative was invited to participate in the managerial committee meeting.

At the meeting the chair of the managerial committee, Jean Lilensten, suggested that Armenia should become the full member of the action in order to actively participate in the creation of the European Space Weather site and to attend managerial committee meetings. It was settled that the financial obligations of Armenia would be clarified by Jean Lilensten in COST Brussels office in April.

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January 2006, CRD has lead on
SEVAN - Space Environment Viewing and Analysis Network
A Nine-country Network Endorsed by the UN/NASA/ESA consortium
in preparation for the International Heliophysical Year 2007 (IHY-07)
Detectors on the network are designed by CRD and will be made in Armenia
Network data acquisition and analysis methods will be managed by the CRD
Principal Investigator – Prof. Ashot Chilingarian, head of CRD

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September 26-30 2005, CRD to host Solar Extreme Events - 2005 international symposium in Armenia

Over 75 scientists from 11 countries will participate in the Solar Extreme Events 2005 conference in Armenia, organized by the Cosmic Ray Division of the Alikhanian Physicis Institute and sponsored by the international Commission On Space Research and the International Science and Technology Center. The local organizing committee and the international advisory committee are chaired by Prof. Ashot Chilingarian, head of the CRD. The program includes presentations by the participants, discussions about the sources of Space Weather and the detection and early warning of events with catastrophic consequences, and a tour of the extensive cosmic ray research facilities on Mt. Aragats. Among the distinguished participants, scientists from NASA, Stanford University and University of Delaware will comprise the US delegation. Several key international organizations list this conference on their calendar. Among them: NASA, Comission on Space Research, European Sapce Agency and others. For more details see http://crdlx5.yerphi.am

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June 2005, CRD wins the Mashtots-1600 All Armenia competition for best content in the e-science category.

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March 2005, NASA Includes Armenia’s Cosmic Ray Stations on its Observatory List

In preparation for the International Heliophysical Year (IHY – 2007), NASA has founded a collaboration of international spacecraft and observatories that conduct solar research. The first step of this collaboration is to display the participating observatories and their internet links on the NASA internet site. The Aragats Space Environmental Center of the Cosmic Ray Division of the Alikhanian Physics Institute in Armenia is number two on the NASA site. To see it please visit http://orpheus.nascom.nasa.gov/~zarro/ihy/ , click on “VIEW Participating Observatories List” and scroll down to the second entry on the “Spacecraft and Observatory” list.

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CRD scientists close the summer of 2004 with an impressive presence at international conferences

CRD's head, Prof. Ashot Chilingarian and scientists Valeri Babayan, Hamlet Martirosyan, Vitali Ivanov, and Garegin Hosepian attended one or more of the following international conferences to present their state of the art research on galactic cosmic rays and space weather: International Symposium on Solar Extreme Events of Oct. - Nov. 2003, in Moscow, Commission On SPAce Research (COSPAR) July 2004, in Paris, European Cosmic Ray Symposium (ECRS) in August 2004, in Florence.

Here is an excerpt from a letter to Prof. Chilingarian from the executive director of COSPAR, "I would also like to take the opportunity of this letter to thank you, as Armenia's National Representative, for participating so actively in the Committee's activities. It is rare for new members to participate to the degree that you have, attending council meetings, ..., seeking COSPAR's assistance in obtaining European Union funding etc. Armenia's participation has added to the value of our Committee's work and has been remarked by our officers and certainly other national and international scientific union members.

We look forward to future close relations, to widening participation by Armenian scientists in the international space research community, and trust you will not hesitate to contact us concerning capacity building activities or other matters in which our collaboration may be of assistance" Dr. I. Revah, September 15, 2004

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September 2004, SCACRD-Canada joins the family of CRD supporters
We welcome SCACRD-Canada to our family. Please see the Support Committee and Press Release sections for more information.

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March 2004, CRD signed a Memorandum Of Understanding (MoU) with the European Sapce Agency (ESA)

CRD and ESA have signed a memorandum of understanding for scientific cooperation in space weather forcasting research. CRD's strong participation in European scientific collaborations will be an important feather in Armenia's hat, when Armenia is considered for joining the EU.

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January 2004, CRD is accepted into the European Comission On Science and Technology (COST) Action 724 to establish a world-Wide Space Weather Alert Network (SWAN)
CRD's Aragats Space Environmental Center (ASEC) is a vital part of the Space Weather Alert Network because it fills a vital gap by virtue of its Geographic location, Ground based detectors that complement sattelite based detectors, its Scientific Expertise, and its Award winning Data Visualization Interactive Network (DVIN)

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December 2003, Armenia's Cosmic Ray Division received a World Summit Award for Best Conent in its Space Weather Forecasting Website, DVIN. The Award ceremony, attended by heads of states and UN officials, was in Geneva on Dec. 10, 2003. To see it, visit http://www.wsis-award.org
then click on WSA Best 03 on the left, then click on e-Science at the top.
Also visit the Press Releases section of this web site for more details.

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November 2 2003,Sydney Opera Soloist, Arax Mansourian, in Concert as a Tribute to the CRD. San Francisco

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April, 2003 The Space Weather Operations Division of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) has partnered with the CRD in Armenia on a proposal to the International Science and Technology Center –

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January, 2003 Professor Chilingarian’s article on Gene Expression Analysis is the 7-th most downloaded article from Mathematical Biosciences Journal in 2002.

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December 2002, Republic of Armenia commemorative stamp of the CRD

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November, 2002 CRD establishes the Aragats Space Environmental Center in Armenia

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October 20, 21, 23 2002, Famous Artists, Violinist Ani Kavafian in concert with Pianist Sahan Arzruni in San Francisco, Fresno, and Los Angeles.

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On April 17, 2002 CERN, the large Inter-European particle accelerator laboratory in Geneva Switzerland, donated $10,000 worth of electronic data acquisition equipment to the CRD in recognition of the vital and outstanding research CRD conducts towards unraveling the mysteries of the Universe by studying particles accelerated from the cosmos towards earth. The equipment became available when CERN shut down its current accelerator operation to upgrade their accelerator and related equipment for the next phase of research at CERN, the Large Hadron Collider. The electronic equipment donated by CERN was transported to the CRD by the United Armenia Fund air shipment free of charge. The Cosmic Ray Division in Armenia and the Support Committee for Armenia's Cosmic Ray Division extend their heartfelt gratitude to CERN and to UAF for their generosity.

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On April 8, 2002, The International Science and Technology Center has approved a small grant for Professor Chilingarian, the head of the Cosmic Ray division, to write a text book on Statistical Analysis. Congratulations to Prof. Chilingarian.