Institute of Fundamental Technological Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences (IPPT PAN) was established as one of the first and most versatile units of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS). Therefore, the Institute has given rise to creating other, independent research institutions, which were shaping within the IPPT to finally become autonomous.
In 1954, headed by Paweł Jan Nowacki, the Department of Electronic Engineering was established at IPPT, to later change into the PAS Institute of Automation (IA) in 1962. The Institute researched in: control theory, cybernetics, systems theory. Evolution of research subjects, together with a growing demand of sharing research results with the state economy, led to the establishment of Institute of Applied Cybernetics in 1971. It continued the works of IA, extended by cybernetic methods and their application in technology, bionics, image recognition, management etc. Two years later, the Institute was incorporated into the Institute of Organization and Management (a joint unit of PAS and the Ministries of Higher Education and Technology). This institute was survived by two buoyant scientific circles, which provided the foundation for two other important units - Institute of Biocybernetics and Biomedical Engineering (1975) and IBS Systems Research Institute (1977).
In 1966, two of the IPPT departments (Electronic Engineering and Magnetics) merged into the Institute of Electron Technology, which played a significant role in providing industrial basis of the Polish electronics.
One of the first departments created after the establishment of PAS Division IV, and set up as an auxiliary unit, which later transformed into one of the first five departments of IPPT PAN, was the Department of Metals (headed by prof. Aleksander Krupkowski). This unit carried out research on producing metals and their alloys, structure of metals and their alloys and on processing metals from raw material into semi-finished products, which were in high demand in many areas of industry. The year 1969 saw the separation of Department of Metallurgy from IPPT, and later its transformation into the Krupkowski Institute of Metallurgy (Aleksander Krupkowski was one of founders of IPPT). The Institute later extended research onto physical chemistry of metals, issues on hydro- and electrometallurgy, crystallization and structural research.
Also in 1969, the Strata Mechanics Research Department emerged from IPPT as an independent research unit. The department was headed by Jerzy Litwiniszyn (the then President of the IPPT Scientific Council). The department research concerned the prescience of the influence of underground mining on the surface of the site, which was related to the protection of industrial, communication and urban facilities against the effects of coal mining in Upper Silesia. In later years, this department was again transformed into the Strata Mechanics Research Institute.
Last unit which emerged from IPPT was the Center for Laser Technologies of Metals. In was established in 1996 as a joint unit of PAS and Kielce University of Technology. The Center scientific activity resulted directly from its earlier research (made by the then Director of IPPT – Henryk Frąckiewicz) on applying lasers in shaping metals.
Later on, the Center would not only focus their activity on researching laser processing technology, but also extend it onto training students and promoting world achievements in the technology among Polish industrial centers.
In addition to research teams who constituted the founding core of newly-established institutes, some scientific teams moved to the already existing institutes, which aimed at extending their scope of interest. Those were:
Department of Analogy (head – Stefan Czarnecki) got transferred to the Institute of Automation in 1963, which then together got transferred to the PAS Institute of Applied Cybernetics.
Department of Isotopic Research (headed by Maciej Radwan) was moved to the Nuclear Research Institute in 1964.
Department of Energy Conversion (head – Zygfryd Jung) was moved to the PAS Power Engineering Problems Committee in 1966.
In 1997, Department of Mechanics and Acoustics of Porous Media (IPPT branch in Poznań), headed by J. Kubik, moved to Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz, creating Chair of Environmental Engineering, soon to have achieved the status of Institute of Engineering and Applied Computer Science. 1994 saw the establishment of the Polish-Japanese Academy of Information Technology, which was founded with a major scientific contribution of employees from the IPPT Department of Theory of Continuous Media (J.P. Nowacki, W. Kosiński i A. Drabik).
During the transformation of the Polish economy in the nineties, certain companies succeeded from the then-existing TECHPAN Research & Development Department of IPPT, including ECHOSON S.A. which continues IPPT research on the design of ultrasound diagnostic methods, and SONOMED, which produces Doppler ultrasound equipment.
