Slobodan Žumer started his career in physics with a BSc & Ph.D. from the University of Ljubljana and a postdoc at the University of Brussels (1975-76). In the periods 1984-86 & 1992-93, he was visiting scientist & professor at Liquid Crystal Institute, KSU, Kent, USA. Since 1986, he is a professor of physics (University of Ljubljana) and a scientific councilor (Jozef Stefan Institute). In 1996 he established the modeling & simulation group “Physics of soft and partially ordered matter”. In the period 2004-2021 he was the head of the inter-institutional research program “Physics of Soft matter, Surfaces, and Nanostructures” coupling Jozef Stefan Institute and the University of Ljubljana. He was the Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics from 2005-07. In the period 2008-12 he was the president of the International Liquid Crystal Society and since 2014 also its Honored Member and recipient of the Pierre Gilles de Gennes ILCS Prize . He is an American Physical Society Fellow, its Outstanding Referee, and a member of European Academy of Sciences and Arts. He received the Zois lifetime achievements award for his research in the field of theoretical soft matter physics and the Freéderiksz Medal of the Russian Liquid Crystal Society for the outstanding scientific results in the field of liquid crystals. His research interests are modeling, simulations, & theory of topological soft mater including liquid crystals, polymers, nematic elastomers, colloids, active systems, composites, and their use for optics & photonics.
Four selected recent publications:
• G. Poy, A. J. Hess, A. J. Seracuse, M. Paul, S. Žumer and I. I. Smalyukh, Interaction and co-assembly of optical and topological solitons, Nat. Photon. 16, 454–461 (2022). [Link][PDF].
• J. Hess, G. Poy, J.-S. B. Tai, S. Žumer, and I. I. Smalyukh, Control of Light by Topological Solitons in Soft Chiral Birefringent Media, Phys. Rev. X 10, 031042 (2020) [Link] [PDF][Physics focus story].
• G. Poy, A. J. Hess, I. I. Smalyukh, and S. Žumer, Chirality-Enhanced Periodic Self-Focusing of Light in Soft Birefringent Media, Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 077801 (2020) [Link] [PDF].
• S. Čopar, J. Aplinc, Z. Kos, S. Žumer and M. Ravnik, Topology of Three-Dimensional Active Nematic Turbulence Confined to Droplets, Phys. Rev. X 9, 031051 (2019). [Link] [PDF].
