The awardees of the Momentum Program are given the opportunity to assemble new research teams in institutions of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (HAS) for their internationally competitive research programmes. This means that talented young researchers under 45 already resident in Hungary or returning from abroad will be given their own research team, well-equipped laboratories and an equitable salary.  

The programme invited applicants working on new topics that attract international attention and have long-term potential. This year the Academy will be supporting the programme to the tune of 300 million forints. (The amount of support will constitute an annual minimum of 30 million and a maximum of 60 million forints per project). This support will be provided for five years and will be divided between the awardees depending on the researcher's requirements for funds and instruments. After five years has elapsed, the president of the Academy will make a decision based on an expert committee's evaluation whether or not to continue financing the individual projects and on the undetermined period of employment of the research teams' leaders. There is an inherent risk in the programme too, since, if at the end of the five year period the Academy establishes that the research team has been unsuccessful, all supplementary support will be withdrawn from the institute along with the team leader's salary, i.e. the research institute's support will decrease by such an amount.

This year 22 applicants took up the challenge: in comparison to last year there was a greater proportion of applicants from Hungary, three from the United States and one from Holland.

András Stipsicz (43) mathematician
András Stipsicz is a researcher at the New York Simons Center for Geometry and Physics and the Rényi Alfréd Research Institute of Mathematics. He obtained his science degree at Rutgers University in the American state of New Jersey in 1994. He has been a Doctor of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences since 2006. His research interest lies in studying spaces of three and four dimensions - a crucial area in theoretical physics. He is also carrying out intensive research into the theory of knots. The DNA spiral can be modelled by a knot where the mathematical attributes of the knot determine the spatial structure of the spiral. András Stipsicz followed the official award ceremony of the Budapest results from the Institute for Mathematical Science building in California and accepted the certificate from the president of HAS virtually.

Csaba Fekete (38) medical doctor
Csaba Fekete is a researcher at the Tufts Medical Centre in Boston and the Endocrine Neurobiology Department of the Institute for Experimental Medical Research at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He gained his PhD in 2003 at the Szentágothai János Neuroscience PhD School. Since 2009 he has been a Doctor of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He has worked in Boston at the New England Medical Center's laboratory for the department of endocrinology. His main area of research is the nervous system networks governing energy distribution in the brain. Understanding these networks of the nervous system makes new approaches possible in the treatment of obesity - a disease affecting the general population - and could contribute to its more effective treatment.

Gergely Szakács (40) medical doctor
Gergely Szakács is a researcher at the Institute of Enzymology of the Biological Research Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He obtained his PhD at Semmelweis University's School of PhD Studies in 2001. His area of research is transporter malignant tumours and the development of a new generation of anti-tumour and tailor-made therapies facilitated by steps toward the development of new processes. There is a need for effective treatment against numerous malignant and transporter tumour diseases because of the so-called multi-drug resistance that develops during therapy. The destruction of drug-resistant cells could significantly decrease the number of cancer cells and by eliminating the tumour cells prevent the reproduction of abnormal cells.

Péter Galajda (36) physicist
Péter Galajda is now a researcher at the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience at the Delft University of Technology. He earned his PhD at the University of Szeged. His research team creates microscopic habitats through the use of micro and nanotechnology in which the life circumstances of bacteria can be regulated. The experimental data gathered are compared to physical, mathematical and theoretical biology models. Via these "artificial ecosystems" it is possible to study how cells interact with each other and the environment. The researchers aim to understand cell-to-cell communication, the competition among bacterium strains and their long-term evolution. Studying microbe communities not only helps scientists better understand the world of tiny life forms but also the evolution of multi-cell life forms and the treatment of bacterial infections. Péter Galajda followed the award ceremony from Holland and accepted the certificate virtually.

László Á. Kóczy (34) mathematician and economist
László Á. Kóczy graduated in mathematics from Cambridge University in Great Britain and earned his diploma and PhD at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium. His research areas are co-operative game theory, political theory and the theory of matching and social decision making. Last year he returned to Hungary from Maastricht, where he worked together with an internationally acclaimed researcher on co-operative game theory, Jean-Jacques Herings, for six years. He studies situations where co-operation is allowed among participants and this common activity has an effect on non-participants, too. Game theory seeks to understand what groups the participants form during the game and how they distribute the income of the group. He also studies risk and power distribution problems. The practical application of László Á. Kóczy and his team could be a more effective way of dealing with cartels limiting competition in the free market, and it could also contribute to an understanding of the complex problems of economic policy caused by globalization.

Tibor Soós (37) chemist
Tibor Soós is a researcher at the Chemical Research Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He earned his PhD in 1998. His area of interest is synthetic organic chemistry. He and his team are working on developing methods to reduce the environmental burden of synthetic processes. His aim is to develop effective, economical and environmentally friendly catalysts and to offer an alternative to poisonous intermediate metal catalysts. A catalyst family he produced became one of the leading, widely applied catalysts of the field. The study written about it by him and his research team was published in Organic Letters, one of the most prestigious journals of organic chemistry, and was the year's most frequently cited article. Such an achievement is unprecedented among research work that was exclusively initiated and conducted by Hungarians in a Hungarian laboratory.

Ádám Gali (37) physicist
Ádám Gali earned his first degree in electrical engineering. At present he is a researcher at the Department of Atomic Physics at the Budapest University of Technology. He earned his PhD in physics in 2001. His previously did research at Harvard University in Cambridge, USA, where he retains his status as a guest researcher. He is working on new solutions to develop biological detectors and third generation solar cells. He seeks cost effective and environmentally friendly solutions to significantly improve the currently used solar cells. He is also working on the production of nano-particles that can be safely used in living organisms. This would make it possible to use nano-particles in medicine; for example, to monitor the development of cancer and provide targeted treatments.