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Workshop on

Emerging Applications of Topological Textures

16-19 September 2026, Heraklion, Crete, Greece

Key dates

  • Friday, July 17, 2026
    Deadline for online applications.
    Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and applicants may be notified about their participation and abstract acceptance shortly after submitting their application. As the number of participants is limited, early application is strongly encouraged.
  • Friday, July 31, 2026
    Official invitations will be sent via the e-COST platform to selected participants.
  • Friday, August 14, 2026
    Finalisation of the participant list.
  • Friday, August 21, 2026
    Final programme published on the website.

Organisers

Contact
For organizational matters please contact
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | FORTH, Greece

Speakers

  • Ümit Akıncı | Dokuz Eylül University, Türkiye
  • Jelena Aleksic | University of Novi Sad, Serbia
  • Miguel A. Alonso | Institut Fresnel/Centrale Med/Univ. Rochester, France
  • Finn Marten Boyer | University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany
  • Etienne Brasselet | CNRS, France
  • Florin Ciubotaru | IMEC, Belgium
  • Cornelia Denz | Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, Germany
  • Mateusz Gołębiewski | Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland
  • Tom Hayward | University of Sheffield, United Kingdom
  • Jorge Iñiguez-Gonzalez | Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology, Luxembourg
  • Dmytro Karakuts | Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Ukraine
  • Georgios Kavoulakis | Hellenic Meditarranean University, Greece
  • Fatima Khanom | Aston University, United Kingdom
  • Ramaz Khomeriki | Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, Georgia
  • Mathias Klaeui | Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany
  • Svitlana Kondovych | Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research (IFW) Dresden, Germany
  • Maciej Krawczyk | Adma Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland
  • Domagoj Kuić | Zagreb University of Applied Sciences, Croatia
  • Zhamila Kulchukova | Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, Germany
  • Vladimir Kuzmiak | Institute of Photonics and Electronics, AS CR, v.v.i., Czech Republic
  • Sofia Lambropoulou | National Technical University of Athens, Greece
  • Reinoud Lavrijsen | Eindhoven University of Technology, Netherlands
  • Atreya Majumdar | University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany
  • Conor McCluskey | Queen's University Belfast, United Kingdom
  • Igor Meglinski | Aston University, United Kingdom
  • Ayush Ramchandra Mokashi | Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics, Halle, Germany
  • Anusree Navallur | University of Crete, Greece
  • Ljubica Oparnica | Faculty of Education in Sombor, University of Novi Sad, Serbia
  • Nicolas Pavloff | Paris-Saclay University, France
  • Dariia Popadiuk | V. G. Baryakhtar Institute of Magnetism of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Ukraine
  • Davi Rodrigues | Politecnico di Bari, Italy
  • Gianluca Ruffato | University of Padova, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Italy
  • Philipp Rybakov | Uppsala University, Sweden
  • Vishesh Saxena | Université de Strasbourg, CNRS, IPCMS, France
  • George Theodorou | University of Crete, Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, Greece
  • Thomas Winyard | University of Dundee, United Kingdom
Speakers

Scope

This workshop will explore the emerging applications of topological textures such as skyrmions, vortices, and domain walls. Covering systems ranging from magnetism and ferroelectrics to photonics and acoustics, it will address their stability, dynamics, and potential for nanotechnology, including computing and sensing. Bringing together established experts and emerging leaders, the workshop will showcase recent advances across these fields and their applications.

Scope

Programme

  Access the e-programme

Location: FORTH’s Science and Cultural Center

12:30 - 13:45 | Registration

13:45 - 14:00 | Opening statements

14:00 - 14:30 |Jorge Iñiguez-Gonzalez
Harnessing ferroelectric textures and quasiparticles

14:30 - 15:00 | Florin Ciobutaru
From Magnetic Excitations to Computing Systems

15:00 - 15:30 | Coffee break

15:30 - 16:00 | Etienne Brasselet
Agile topological shaping of light from anisotropic media

16:00 - 16:30 | Igor Meglinski
Topological Memory of Optical Vortices: From Chiral Persistence to Dynamic Disorder

16:30 - 16:50 | Vladimir Kuzmiak
Topological textures in non-Hermitian (subwavelength) photonic structures

19:00 | Peripatetic School (walk on the city walls)

20:00 | Dinner

Location: FORTH’s Science and Cultural Center

09:00 - 09:30 |  Gianluca Ruffato
Taming light topology with advanced metaoptics

09:30 - 09:50 | Zhamila Kulchukova
Catastrophes in topological transformations of optical vortex rings

09:50 - 10:10 | Philipp Rybakov
Magnetic hopfions: leveraging three-dimensional topology for novel applications

10:10 - 10:30 | Vishesh Saxena
Strain driven domain wall network with chiral topological junctions in an antiferromagnet

10:30 - 11:00 | Coffee break

11:00 - 11:30 |  Miguel Alonso
Covering spheres and higher order compact manifolds with optical fields

11:30 -11:50 | Ljubica Oparnica
Towards a Fractional Theory of Chiral Skyrmions

11:50 - 12:10 | Anusree Navallur
Positional memory of skyrmions in magnetic bilayers

12:10 - 12:30 | Fatima Khanom
Topological Phase Structures of Conical Refraction Beams: Fractional Orbital Angular Momentum as a Continuous Vortex Parameter for Sensing

12:30 -14:10 | Lunch break

14:00 - 14:30 | Atreya Majumdar
Towards Unconventional Computing: Making Magnetic Materials Matter

14:30 - 14:50 | Dmytro Karakuts
Domain wall behaviour manipulation by nanostripe cross section tailoring

14:50 - 15:30 | Coffee break

15:30 - 15:50 | George Theodorou
Profile and dynamics of Antiferromagnetic domain walls under spin-orbit torque

15:50 - 16:10 | Ümit Akıncı
Dynamic Fingerprinting of Topological Nucleation in Bilayer Synthetic Antiferromagnets

16:10 - 17:00 | Discussion

Location: FORTH’s Science and Cultural Center

09:00 - 09:30 | Svitlana Kondovych
Surface and strain control of polar textures in nanoscale ferroelectrics

09:30 - 09:50 | Thomas Winyard
Towards a simple model for the dynamics of magnetic skyrmions

09:50 - 10:10 | Georgios Kavoulakis
Phase diagram of rotating Bose-Einstein condensates trapped in power-law and hard-wall potentials

10:10 - 10:30 | Maciej Krawczyk
Magnetostatic interaction to stabilise the magnetic textures in nanostructures

10:30 - 11:00 | Coffee break

11:00 - 11:30 | Conor McCluskey
Arrays of Polar Helices at Twisted Bonded Ferroelectric Interfaces

11:30 -11:50 | Nicolas Pavloff
A new topological glance at Anderson's phase slippage mechanism

11:50 - 12:10 | Ramaz Khomeriki
Dynamics of Ferroelectric Vortices in Nanostructured Superlattices

12:10 - 12:30 | Sofia Lambropoulou
The theory of doubly periodic tangles

12:30 - 14:00 | Lunch break

14:00 - 14:30 | Reinoud Lavrijsen
Facilitating electrical and laser-induced skyrmion nucleation with a dipolar-field enhanced effective DMI

14:30 - 15:00 | Tom Hayward
Go Hard(ware network) or Go Home: Networking Spintronic Metamaterials for Neuromorphic Computation

15:00 - 15:30 | Coffee break

15:30 - 17:00 |  Poster session

Location: Moinoterra Winery, Archanes

10:00 - 10:30 | Mathias Klaeui
Magnetic Topological Spin Structures from 2D to 3D

10:30 - 11:00 | Coffee break

11:00 - 11:30 | Cornelia Denz
Topological textures in quantum systems - Applications from metrology to optics

11:30 - 12:00 | Davi Rodrigues
Emerging Applications of Magnetic Topological Textures

12:00 - 14:00 | Discussion

Program

Meeting Venue

The meeting will take place at FORTH’s Science and Cultural Center, located at the corner of Averof & Zografou Street in central Heraklion, for the first three days (Wednesday, September 16 to Friday, September 18). On the final day (Saturday, September 19), the meeting will relocate to the Moinoterra Winery in the village of Archanes. The Heraklion venue is easily accessible from most city accommodations and within walking distance of central facilities.

Venues

Important notes

  • Registration Fee

    There is no registration fee. Participation includes access to all sessions and coffee breaks.

  • Personal Arrangements

    Participants are responsible for arranging their own accommodation, lunches, and dinners.

  • Entry Requirements

    Participants should independently ensure they meet entry requirements for Greece. For general European Union entry guidelines, visit this link. 

  • Budget Allocation

    The available budget will be allocated in accordance with the COST Excellence and Inclusiveness Policy.

  • Notification of Support

    Decisions regarding COST support will be communicated to participants well in advance of the meeting to allow sufficient time for travel arrangements.

  • Travel Reimbursement and Daily Allowance

    The reimbursement consists of two components: long-distance travel and daily allowance (DA). 
    The maximum reimbursement for long-distance travel and the daily allowance rate, as specified in the COST Annotated Rules, may be re-adjusted following a decision by the Management Committee.
    Did you receive an invitation through e-COST to participate in the workshop on September 16-19 in Heraklion? Does your invitation indicate that you are eligible for financial support? Read here the procedure to follow!

Important notes