ASTROSUMMIT-2026

Samo Kralj was awarded PhD in physics from University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, in 1991. He carried out postdoctoral education at School of Mathematics, University of Southampton (UK, 1992) and at Solid State Department, Jožef Stefan Institute (Ljubljana, 1993-1996). He was visiting researcher at Isaak Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences, University of Cambridge (Fall 2013) and University of Sorbonne in Paris (Fall 2025). Currently, he is full professor at Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at University of Maribor in Slovenia, where he is the head of the laboratory Physics of Complex Systems. He is also employed as Senior researcher at Solid State Department and lectures at the International Postgraduate School at Jozef Stefan Institute in Ljubljana. His research interests include soft materials, biophysics and nanomaterials. On these topics he has so far published about 250 papers in international journals which acquired about 6000 citations. Among others he was General chair of the 11th European Conference on Liquid Crystals (2011, Maribor, Slovenia) and General chair of the ESF Exploratory Workshop “Defect assembled soft matter for nanoscience and nanotechnology” (2013, Rogaska Slatina, Slovenia). He is very active as a science promotor. He has obtained several awards for his research and educational achievements (“Silver Award” from the University of Maribor in 2001 for exceptional achievements in education, Award “Prometej of Science” from the Slovenian Science Foundation in 2009 for exceptional popularization of science, “Golden Reward” from the University of Maribor in 2012 for exceptional achievements in research and education, “Golden Reward” from Society for Technical Culture of Slovenia in 2001 for popularization of science, Award for outstanding educational achievements and constantly highest marks in students assessments from Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in 2011, “Zois award” -the highest Slovenian award for outstanding scientific discoveries - from the Republic Slovenia in 2020, Award from the Republic Slovenia -the highest Slovenian award for university level education- for outstanding achievements in education in 2021, Award for outstanding scientific discoveries from Faculty of Natural Sciences in 2022 and Award for outstanding scientific discoveries achievements in education from University of Maribor in 2023. He is also piano player in PhD Big Bang Band at Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at University of Maribor and active as cartoonist.