Dr. Marin Simeonov, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Chemistry and Pharmacy, Department of Pharmaceutical and Applied Organic Chemistry, Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski” has been awarded as The Best Young Investigator for 2017 in the field of Polymer Science in Bulgaria.

The award has been established and funded by Prof. Ivan Shopov, long-time Director of the Institute of Polymers, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and one of the best world known Bulgarian scientists in the field of Polymer Science. The award is under auspices of the Bulgarian Union of Chemists, The Bulgarian Polymer Society and the Institute of Polymers, BAS and has been bestowed for the 14^th time this year.

Prof. Ivan Shopov bestowed the Award to Dr. Marin Simeonov on the 1^st of March, 2017, at a specially organized event devoted to the 27^th anniversary of the Institute of Polymers, BAS.

Dr. M. Simeonov participated in the competition with two papers in the field of polymer science, published in 2016 in the journal RSC Advances (IF 2016 =3.289) and 4 participations at scientific conferences in the same year. The scientific investigations presented in the papers are about the synthesis, characterization and applications of interpenetrating polymer networks hydrogels as drug delivery systems as well as matrices for controlled biomineralization.

Corr. Mem. Konstantin Hadjiivanov, Vice President of BAS, Prof. Ivan Shopov, Dr. Marin Simeonov, Dr. Petya Tsekova, Institute of Polymers, who received a Diploma for excellent participation in the competition and Assoc. Prof. Nely Koseva, Director of the Institute of Polymers, BAS.

Prof. Ivan Shopov and Dr. Marin Simeonov.