The Graduate Program in Physics at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (PPGFSC/UFSC) announces the 3rd Call for the 2026/2 Doctoral Scholarship Allocation Process, pursuant to Public Notice No. 004/2026/PPGFSC.
The Graduate Program in Physics at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (PPGFSC/UFSC) announces the preliminary results for Public Notices No. 005/2026/PPGFSC and No. 006/2026/PPGFSC. These notices concern the internal selection of projects for applications to FAPESC Master’s and Doctoral scholarships (FAPESC Public Calls No. 043/2026 and No. 044/2026) for the 2026/2 semester.
The registration period for the 2026-2 Unified Physics Exam (EUF) will be open from August 5 to September 9, 2026. Registrations must be completed online through the exam’s official website:
👉https://www1.fisica.org.br/~euf/index.php/pt/
The exam will be administered on September 30, 2026, and may be taken at the Department of Physics of the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC) in Florianópolis, as well as at various other locations in Brazil and abroad.
Some areas of the Graduate Program in Physics at UFSC (Florianópolis) use, among other selection criteria, the scores from the Unified Graduate Physics Exam (EUF) for admission to master’s and doctoral programs. The score obtained on the exam is an important part of the candidate selection process.
Participants of the 1st KMOS VVVX–GalCen Spectroscopic Survey Workshop, held in December 2025 at the Institute of Astrophysics of Universidad Andrés Bello (Chile). The meeting brought together the scientific team involved in the VVV/VVVX surveys and in planning the new spectroscopic survey with the KMOS instrument at the Very Large Telescope (VLT). Credit: Dante Minniti
Astronomers began this week the first observations of a new large international survey called KMOS VVVX-GalCen Spectroscopic Survey, which will investigate tens of thousands of objects in the central region of the Milky Way. The project includes the participation of researcher Roberto K. Saito, professor at the Department of Physics at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), the only Brazilian institution present in the main survey team.
The observations are carried out at the Very Large Telescope (VLT), one of the most advanced optical observatories in the world, located at the Cerro Paranal Observatory in the Atacama Desert, northern Chile. The telescope is operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO).
The KMOS VVVX-GalCen is the first major spectroscopic survey led from Chile, and it was selected by ESO as one of only two large programs that will use the KMOS (K-band Multi Object Spectrograph) instrument over the next three years. In total, the project received 140 nights of observation, which corresponds to a scientific investment estimated at about 8 million dollars in telescope time.
The project is led by astronomers Matías Gómez, from Universidad Andrés Bello (Chile), and Francisco Nogueras-Lara, from the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalucía (Spain). Saito is part of the central group of researchers in the survey and is responsible for one of the scientific areas of the project.
“The first night of observations at Paranal was monitored remotely and went smoothly. Now begins the stage of analyzing the first spectra,” explains the researcher.
The observed targets were selected from two previous highly successful surveys: the VVV/VVVX, which mapped much of the Milky Way in infrared light over the past decade, and GALACTICNUCLEUS, a high-resolution survey of the innermost regions of our galaxy. The new survey will obtain spectra, a technique that allows decomposing the light of celestial objects and revealing properties such as chemical composition, temperature, and velocity.
Among the main scientific objectives are the study of rogue planets that wander freely through space, star clusters hidden by galactic dust, star-forming regions, and distant galaxies concealed behind the plane of the Milky Way. In the future, the survey is also expected to include spectroscopic observations of objects identified by the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), expanding the scientific possibilities of the project.
Learn more on the project website.
Elected directors of the SBPMat
Professor Ivan Bechtold, from the Department of Physics at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), has been elected for a second two-year term (2026–2027) as President of the Brazilian Materials Research Society (SBPMat). SBPMat was founded in 2002, and Professor Ivan is the first researcher from outside the Southeast region to lead it.
The society brings together researchers from fields such as Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, Biology, Health Sciences, Agricultural Sciences, and Engineering, all focused on the study and technological applications of materials. SBPMat’s annual event, internationally recognized in the field of materials, the Brazilian Materials Research Society (B-MRS), gathers around 2,000 participants from nearly every state in Brazil and also from abroad.
Ivan joined UFSC in 2006 and is currently a Full Professor in the Department of Physics. He is also a permanent faculty member of UFSC’s Graduate Programs in Physics (PPGFSC) and Chemistry (PPGQ).
