Preface

Abstract

PREFACEThe “Victor Villanueva Memorial Meeting” to pay homage to our friend and colleague Victor Manuel Villanueva Sandoval was held at the premises of the Institute of Physics and Mathematics, University of Michoacán in Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico, on December 6, 2013, about 3 months after his tragic demise. This gathering was attended by his close friends, family, collaborators, colleagues and students. Several of those who could not physically be present for this commemorative gathering sent their messages of condolence and/or scientific contributions for this proceedings volume for which we are immensely grateful.The meeting started with personal recollections by Victor’s wife Ana Rosa Tenorio Lúa and his sisters Alejandra and Gabriela Villanueva. His daughters Ana Paola, Daniela and Mariana were also present to grace the solemn occasion and later provided us with their heart-felt messages. The academic part of the meeting started with Adnan Bashir presenting a summary of Victor’s scientific life, his research and its impact.Research talks were then presented by Luis Villaseñor (Ultra energetic cosmic rays - recent results), Mauro Napsuciale (A formalism for higher spins based on parity), Christian Schubert (Amplitudes with many photons in QED), Naser Ahmadiniaz (Amplitudes with gluons in a string inspired formalism), Carlos Vaquera (Second order fermions and renormalization) and Adnan Bashir (Strong interactions - peculiarities and challenges). There were several potential and interested speakers who were unable to physically attend the meeting but, as we have mentioned before, agreed to send their contribution for the proceedings volume at a later date. They are Dmitry Antonov (University of Lisboa, Portugal), Fiorenzo Bastianelli and Roberto Bonezzi (University of Bologna and INFN, Italy), Olindo Corradini (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy), Pietro Dall’Olio (University of Michoacán, Mexico), Jan Govaerts (Université Catholique de Louvian, Belgium), Emanuele Latini (University of Zurich, Switzerland), Khaled Hassan Ould-Lahoucie (University Ferhat Abbas of Setif, Algeria), Eckehard Mielke (Metropolitan Autonomous University of Iztapalapa, Mexico), Néstor Ortiz, Olivier Sarbach and Thomas Zannias (University of Michoacán, Mexico).We are very grateful to the director Ricardo Becerril and personnel of the Institute of Physics and Mathematics, University of Michoacán, who ensured a smooth and pleasant organization of the meeting. We offer our special thanks to Itzel Alvarez who prepared a beautiful poster to announce the meeting. She also organized the personal part of the material for the proceedings in an outstanding manner.Finally, we would like this meeting and the proceedings volume to serve as a token of our appreciation and admiration for our friend Victor Villanueva. We also hope it serves as an inspiration for Victor’s students and his daughters Paola, Daniela and Mariana to follow in his footsteps and attempt to reach the stars.Adnan BashirChristian Schubert