József Vigassy

For nearly 50 years, he participated in the research activities of the Atomic Energy Research Institute (AEKI) of the Central Physical Research Institute (KFKI) of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and its predecessors in the field of numerical and computer methods. He developed semi-automatic measurement and evaluation software as early as the 1960s.
As Hungary's official liaison to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Nuclear Technology Program Library, his duties included managing the methods of program exchange between the different machine representatives.

In the 1970s, he created a system program for accident simulation of HTGR (high-temperature gas-cooled reactor) nuclear reactors in Jülich (West Germany), and then, in addition to participating in the development of the Paks block simulator software, he managed the thermal reconstruction design and calculations of the KFKI research reactor. He achieved results in the field of operational and safety calculations of various fuel assemblies. He was registered as a software expert in 1964.

His multidisciplinary scientific work is indicated by about 100 publications. He participated as a lecturer in the undergraduate and postgraduate courses in nuclear engineering at the Budapest University of Technology (BME). He wrote a book on programming techniques with mathematician Gyula Lőcs, which has been published many times, and was a teaching aid at several universities.

He was a member of the Bolyai János Mathematical Society (BJMT) and the Technical Council of one of the Interministerial Research Programs. He headed the Nuclear Engineering Department of the Energy Management Scientific Association (ETE) and was a member of the Energy Committee of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. In 1992, he assumed the position of Vice-President of the National Atomic Energy Committee (OAB), and then in 1993-1994, he was Vice-President of the Presidential Council of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) based in Vienna.

In 1989, he received the gold grade of the Outstanding Inventor Award. In 2015, the Hungarian Chamber of Engineers honored him with the Ferenc Ronkay Award.