The recipient of the 2026 Research Excellence Award of the European Mineralogical Union is Dr. Anna Pakhomova, Research Professor at the Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC), Spain.
Anna Pakhomova obtained her PhD in 2013 at Saint Petersburg State University (Russia). After four years as a crystallographic engineer at the same university, she joined the Institute of Geological Sciences at the University of Bern (Switzerland) for a short stay before becoming a postdoctoral fellow at the Bayerisches Geoinstitut in Germany for two years. She then worked at the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (PETRA III) before, in 2021, joining the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble (France) as a beamline scientist (ID27). She obtained her Habilitation in Natural Sciences at the University of Bayreuth in 2022. In November 2026, she joined the Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC) in San Sebastián (Spain) as a Research Professor.
Her principal research interests focus on the crystallography of high-pressure minerals, ices, and other crystalline materials under extreme conditions to understand the structural and chemical processes in planetary interiors and icy moons. She employs cutting-edge single-crystal and powder X-ray diffraction under high-pressure and high- or low-temperature conditions. She currently leads an ESRF grant and an ANR project, and she was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant (2025 call) focused on the effect of high pressure on organic chemistry in large ocean worlds.
Anna Pakhomova has notably deciphered the role of very high pressure on minerals with structural complexity (polysomatism, polymorphism, distortion, “self-insertion”, or hydrophobicity), such as murataite, danburite (pentacoordinated silicon), borates, CaBe2P2O8, skutterudite, wüstite, feldspars, clathrate hydrates, and calcium silicate-carbonate. Her recent research focuses on the behavior under pressure and the chemical composition and evolution of previously neglected solid phases that are key components of Saturn’s moon Titan, Jupiter’s moons Ganymede and Callisto, and water-rich exoplanets. She has extended our understanding through detailed characterization of these high-pressure phases that compose distant ocean worlds, helping link astrophysical investigations of their interiors to the complex chemistry of these aqueous environments, with potential implications for prebiotic chemistry.
Alongside her strong achievements in mineral physics, she also shines through her dedication to the mineralogy community, as evidenced by her role as technical editor at American Mineralogist, where she reviews all new mineral structures before publication. She is also a member of the International Advisory Committee of EHPRG 2027 and an active member of “Women in High Pressure”.
Anna Pakhomova has emerged as a strong leader in mineral physics using diamond-anvil cells and X-ray diffraction at the European level. Given the major impact of her numerous achievements, Anna Pakhomova is truly worthy of receiving the EMU Medal for Research Excellence 2026.