MT-22 - Obituary [of Milan Polak]

Milan Polak passed away on January 31st, 2012. This was sad news for Milan's colleagues and co-workers from Slovakia and abroad, in particular for the International Organizing Committee of the MT-22. In addition to actively participating at MT-22 as an oral presenter, Milan had been part of the MT IOC since MT-16. Many of his colleagues have memories of happy moments spent with Milan at the MT conferences throughout the years. Milan was born in 1937 in Strekov, Slovakia. He completed his university studies in 1960 and received his PhD in 1967 at Slovakia Academy of Science (SAS) at Bratislava. Since 1960, Milan was employed by the Institute of Electrical Engineering (IEE), SAS at Bratislava. He was a member of several scientific boards and had been the director of IEE. He was well known internationally and was a visiting scientist in various institutes, in particular at CEA Saclay in 1975 and at the Applied Superconductivity Center of Madison (USA) from 1992 to 1995. Milan made significant contributions to applied superconductivity, which have been covered by about 190 publications in international journals. They deal with sophisticated investigations regarding the fine electromagnetic behavior of strands and conductors related to stability, ac losses, current distribution, global performances, all questions which are still being considered today.