Five Hungarian students, three girls, and two boys, will be traveling to Poland for the 16th International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics (IOAA). The preparation of the Hungarian team was supported by the ELKH Research Centre for Astronomy and Earth Sciences (CSFK), as well as by the Municipality of Jászberény and the employees of the Public Library of Jászberény.
The Hungarian team prepared for this year's competition in Jászberény, where they solved complex theoretical tasks, practiced night-time telescope observations, complemented by planetarium and celestial knowledge, as well as data analysis training, as explained by Nikolett Vincze, the project coordinator of the Astronomy Olympiad at CSFK.
In the Olympic team, Blanka Schmercz, a graduating student from ELTE Apáczai Csere János Practicing High School, secured the first position, followed by Zsóka Horváth, an 11th-grade student from Zrínyi Miklós High School in Zalaegerszeg, and in the third position, Dorottya Elekes, a 10th-grade student from the Budapest-Fasori Lutheran Secondary School. Further members include Gergely Péter Vári, an 11th-grade student from Fazekas Mihály Practicing Primary School and Secondary School in Budapest, and Sándor Sarkadi, a graduating student from Szent Imre Catholic High School in Nyíregyháza.
The Hungarian team will depart for Chorzów on August 10. The students will be accompanied by their leaders, József Kovács, a senior research fellow at the ELTE Gothard Astrophysical Observatory (ELTE GAO), and Gergely Dálya, a postdoctoral researcher in astronomy from Ghent University, as well as their observers, Zoltán Jäger, an astronomer at the Baja Astronomical Observatory, and Nikolett Vincze.