It is with deep sadness that we received the news of the unexpected death of our colleague and friend
a long-time member of our team, an excellent physicist who explored the knowledge about soft matter and its secrets with passion and commitment.
We will never forget her cheerfulness and perseverance in solving complex problems. Her dedication to scientific work will remain deeply in our memory and will serve as a beacon for our future activities.
We express our heartfelt condolences to Małgosia's family and loved ones, with whom we are united in sorrow.
Directors of the The Henryk Niewodniczański
Institute of Nuclear Physics
Polish Academy of Sciences
Employees and students of the Department of Condensed Matter Physics
The farewell took place on March 2, at 4:00 p.m. at the cemetery in Gosia’s hometown of Łącko.
It is with deep regret that we learned about the sudden passing of our colleague Małgorzata Jasiurkowska-Delaporte, an experienced physicist possessing a great talent of an experimenter curious about the discovered laws of nature.
Gosia graduated from the Faculty of Physics and Nuclear Technology (currently the Faculty of Physics and Applied Computer Science) of the AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow, where in 2004 she obtained the degree of Master of Science in Physics for the thesis "Studies on the properties of materials for permanent magnets using the MRI method", supervised by Prof. Czesław Kapusta. Over 2005-2010, she was a doctoral student of the International Doctoral Study IFJ PAN at the then Department of Structural Research, where in 2010 she obtained a PhD in physical sciences for her dissertation entitled "Study of the structure and dynamics of compounds of the homologous series of isothiocyanatobiphenyls", prepared under the supervision of Prof. Maria Massalska-Arodź and defended with honors. In 2010, she was the winner of the Scientific Award of Henryk Niewodniczański for a series of publications presenting a study of the structural properties of the smectic phase E in substances of the nBT homologous series and a description of the dynamics of molecules in the vicinity of the glass transition. Also in 2010, she received the Second Prize of the Polish Liquid Crystal Society for her doctoral thesis. In 2010-2012, she completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Leipzig under a scholarship from the Humboldt Foundation. As a PostDoc, she cooperated with the NanoBioMedical Center of the University of Adam Mickiewicz in Poznań in 2013-2015. From 2016, she was an assistant professor at the Department of Soft Matter Research of IFJ PAN, where she established the Dielectric Spectroscopy Laboratory, which she headed until the last moments of her life. She obtained her habilitation degree in physical sciences in 2022.
Gosia's scientific achievements are impressive. She specialized in dielectric spectroscopic studies, determining the characteristic relaxation times of molecules for substances in various thermodynamic states. She introduced a new method of sample preparation in the form of thin polymer fibers as a soft spatial limitation for mixtures with liquid crystals. Her pioneering work on the identification of the glass transition in highly ordered smectic phases E and on the distinction between the hexatic and crystalline smectic phase B is an undisputed breakthrough in soft matter research. In her studies of many new liquid crystal substances, she combined measurement methods, such as X-ray diffraction, dielectric spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy and polarizing microscopy. Gosia's passion was science, she was open to new research ideas, an example of which was her cooperation with research centers: in the country, including the University of Silesia and the Jagiellonian University, and abroad (Belgium, Portugal, Japan). She also willingly cooperated with other research groups from the Condensed Phase Physics Department of IFJ PAN. She had her own thoughts on many areas of our field that she passionately reported on. She was also deeply involved in popularizing physics among children and teenagers.
Today, not only the Polish community of physics but also we, her friends, colleagues, co-workers and students, have suffered a great loss.
Gosia, you and your attitude, commitment to pursuing your scientific passion and approach to everyday matters will be a paragon for us to follow. Your gentleness and resoluteness, as well as your inner warmth, have united people from all over the world, whom you have left in immense sadness.
You will remain in our memory forever.
See you.