Prof. Ariel Chialvo,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge; University of Tennessee, Knoxwille, USA

The Workshop on Modern Problems of Soft Matter at Lviv (Ukraine) was a very successful and productive meeting:

a) Well-organized meeting, with timely sessions, coffee and lunch breaks. 
b) High quality speakers from an international pool of experts in the field, and a wide selection of subjects.
c) Very helpful hosts, always at hand and eager to make our stay at Lviv more rewarding.
d) All activities held within the same building, i.e.,  creating the proper environment for friendly discussions and fruitful exchange of ideas.

This participant is grateful to the organizers of this workshop for the invitation to participate, and to the U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation for the Independent States of the Former Soviet Union (CRDF) for the financial support to make his attendance possible.

An excellent meeting.  Prof. Holovko and I were able to initiate a research  project and have obtained promising preliminary results. 

I thought it was a very good meeting, in general. I would have loved to see more biological applications of statistical mechanics.

This meeting played a very valuable role in fostering contacts and  connections between physicists and chemists in the Ukraine and other parts  of  Europe and the United States who have a common interest in the science  of the liquid state.

I consider this meeting a worthwhile experience.  It allowed exchange of scientific ideas between East and West.  The quality of presentation was high.  International experts in the liquid-fluid-soft matter areas could discuss and form collaborations.  I think this is most worthwhile.

I would like to thank you for inviting me on the conference. I enjoyed my  stay in Lviv very much. Please pass my best greetings to  all your colleagues from the organizing committee. 

It was a great pleasure to be in Lviv. Your meeting was beautifuly organized and the scientific contact I had are of unapprocheable value.

The meeting was extremely valuable and interesting.  What made it  particularly good was the well balanced mixture of Ukrainian and US  etc. scientists.  There was much new to be learned on both sides, as  both scientific traditions are very strong and well developed, with too few opportunities such as this for direct exchange of ideas. This was a good idea and it was well carried out and organized.

 First of all I would like to thank you for your hospitality in Lviv and  for arranging such an outstanding meeting. The entire visit was very pleasant and interesting. I am very happy that we have met and that we will have an opportunity to work together. 

The international workshop organized by the Institute for Condensed Matter Physics provided a valuable opportunity to bring together a fairly large group of local and foreign scientists representing several diverse areas of   condensed phase theory and experiment.  The workshop was very well organized with a well selected venue and accomodations.  The hospitality of the hosts was exceptional by any standards.  Considering the harsh economic situation makes the accomplishment of the local organizers even more impressive.  In terms of the scientific program, most striking was the uniformly high level of the mathematical skills of both the senior researchers and the graduate students from L'viv and the Ukraine in general.  This would be difficult to match at most US institutions.  As far as the style of work is concerned, there is a clear emphasis on obtaining closed form solutions and approximations, rather than relying on computationally intensive simulations. Three principal areas of strength emerged from the lectures and poster presentations:

    1. Statistical theory of complex solutions, particularily electrolytes and ionic liquids (L'viv)
    2. Classical and quantum theory of magnetic and ferroelectric materials (L'viv)
    3. Theory of liquid crystalline and light scattering media (Kyiv)

It was noticed by several foreigh visitors, including myself, that in many presentations the link between theory and experiment was weak or absent.  Undoubtedly, this stems from the disparity between the long standing strength of theory and the lack of resources for experimental work.  Considering the increasingly facil communication and exchange with foreign scientists it will be crucial to teach the younger researchers to cast their work within the context of exisiting or potential experiments.  Especially in an area of theory with such broad applied relevance, ranging from materials science through process control through to biological and envirnomentla problems, it will be very important to bridge this gap.  Meetings and workshops of this type will certainly play a significant role in making this happen. 

It was a  great meeting in Lwiw. I thoroughly enjoyed it.