SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

The purpose of BELVAC is to promote the

development of vacuum science and technology

and to contribute to its advancement in Belgium. It

also has its objective to create and to maintain inte

resting and useful relations between its members

(academics and industrials) concerning vacuum

and to provide interesting and useful relations with

foreign vacuum societies and with international

organizations having the same objectives.

Belgiumhas been a key player in the field of vacuum

science since the early days. The first International

Congress on Vacuum Technology, organized in

connection with the 1958 Brussels World Fair, by

the Belgian group “Vacuum Techniques Section”

of the Société Royale Belge des Ingénieurs et des

Industriels on 10-13 June 1958 in Namur (Belgium),

is indeed generally accepted as the founding event

that ultimately led in 1962 to the formation of the

International Union for Vacuum Science, Technique

and Applications (IUVSTA).

Anniversaries of the foundation of BELVAC were

often celebrated in the context of international

BELVAC, the Belgian Vacuum Society was founded on May 16, 1963 from the merging of two

elder groups: the section on VacuumTechnique of the “Société Royale Belge des Ingénieurs et

des Industriels, asbl”, founded in 1954, and the other was a contact group “Nuclear Sciences

and Low Pressures” of the “Institut Interuniversitaire des Sciences Nucléaires”, founded in

1955. BELVAC is nowadays a non-profit society with legal status. The organization consists

in a council with a president, a secretary, 9 representatives in the IUVSTA Divisions and

5 administrators. BELVAC was the representative of the Belgian Standardization Organization

in the six working groups of the International Standards Organization (ISO)TC 112.

BELVAC also serves as a liaison between the Secretary General of IUSTVA and the Belgian

Ministry of Justice on the IUVSTA Statutes.

Figure 1. Photographs taken during the celebration of the 40

anniversary of BELVAC (Gent, November 24

, 2003).

Left-hand side: From left-to-right: Mrs. Dupont, Mr. Dupont, Mr. De Gryse, Middle: From left-to-right: Mr. Depla (Chair of

theTF division (2013-2016)), Mrs. Van Nevel, Mr.Thys, Mr. Vanden Berghe, Righ-hand side: From left-to-right: Mr. De Gryse

(TFD Chair 2004-2007), Mr. Reniers (Treasurer at IUVSTA (for 3 triennia in 2018))

THE BELGIAN VACUUM SOCIETY

Société Belge de Vacuologie et de Vacuotechnique/Belgische

Vereniging voor Vacuologie en Vacuumtechniek (BELVAC)

Original (1986) by J. Dupont

Updated (2001) by R. Vanden Berghe

Updated (2018) by D. Depla, R. De Gryse and R. Snyders