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Matt Apuzzo: American people trust big companies, in Europe people trust their governments

nasa.univerzita@uniba.sk — Thu, 13 Jan 2022 11:31:00 +0100

Mr. Apuzzo, you have won the Pulitzer prize not once, not twice, but three times. However, some people may not know that you started as a student of biology. I did. I was a Pre-Med student, and I thought I would be a doctor one day. By the end of your studies, you were the editor of your college newspaper. Would you say that you have found your true calling in journalism, even though you majored in something else? I for sure did. I’ve also realized that I was not nearly as good a scientist as I hoped I’d be. I took organic chemistry and did very, very poorly. Just barely passed. That was the final sign that maybe medical school was not for me. I had been working for the school paper and it always seemed like fun to me. It never felt like work. I had an internship at the local paper in my university town and that never felt like work either. It just sort of occurred to me – maybe if I could find a way to do that, then all the better. Basically, your hobby has become your job. And then it brought you a few Pulitzer Prizes. It’s funny. When you’re starting off, you think of the Pulitzer Prize as the award for the most valuable player. But once you’ve been in this job for a while, you realize it’s more like winning the Champions League. No matter whose name is on it, it’s all about teamwork. The times I’ve won, it was always thanks to a group of people. It's hard work. A reporter needs colleagues who work as hard as he does. I was very lucky. What advice would you give to students who are thinking about switching their major or taking a different career path? Because, obviously, such a change has worked out for you. That’s a great question. In the United States people change their major all the time. I don’t know how it works in Slovakia, but I know that in European schools you tend to apply for a program and that’s the program you’re in. You can’t just say: “Oh, I don’t want to do Economics anymore, I want to try Literature”. But in the United States it’s very common, because who knows, as a 17-year-old, where they want to be for the rest of their life? To this extent our students have more ability to learn something new that pushes them out of their comfort zone. It only increases the chance they’re going to find something they are truly passionate about. I would say, if you discover that you’re not passionate about the thing you’re doing right now – you want to be passionate about something else, or you already are passionate about something else – follow that. University is short, life is long and if you’re not excited about the road you’re on, it’s probably not worth it. What would you recommend to future journalists? Is there one specific skill or strategy on how to write Pulitzer-winning material? Read a lot. Read journalists that you admire and see how they structure their stories. See how they build their story from the ground up and really study that. Try to put those lessons into your own writing. If you have people in this world whose work you admire, reach out to them. Don’t be afraid to ask for advice, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Be curious and read a lot. So, is it necessary to find a tutor or mentor who will guide, teach, and help us? That’s exactly right. Be somebody who loves to learn and find somebody who loves to teach. You also taught at Georgetown University in Washington. Yes, and I’m still affiliated with Georgetown University. I haven’t taught in a few years because I’ve been abroad, but I love it! It was amazing to be in class again when we had a workshop at the Department of Journalism here in Bratislava. You are currently working in Brussels as an investigative correspondent for The New York Times. How does it feel compared to your previous experiences in Washington, which you covered for more than ten years? It’s different. I was really feeling like I needed to grow. It doesn’t matter where you are in your career, you need to constantly be growing and learning new things. So, I’m learning a lot, which is really important to me. The obstacles are different in my current job – obstacles of language, obstacles of understanding the politics of all the European countries. Wherever I might go, there are new challenges, but they are all very exciting challenges. What have you learned about Europe? What makes Europe different from the rest of the world or at least from the United States? I will say one thing that I think is interesting. In Europe, I find that in general, people are much more suspicious of companies, big industries, and much more trusting of their governments. Much more trusting? Right. In the United States it’s the opposite. Nobody trusts their government, and everybody trust these companies. And here’s a good example. I will say, I don’t want to have a national ID card, or I don’t want the government to have my health information, or I don’t want to do anything that could allow anybody to track me. But I’m going to walk around with my cell phone in my pocket all the time and give my information to Apple or Google. I get mad if the government wants to ask me a question I don’t want to answer, but I just hit “accept” every time something comes up on the internet, like privacy settings or cookies. I think in Europe people are much more skeptical of the big companies having their data, but much more comfortable with the government. Because they say: “We can vote out our government, we can change it, we have a say. We have no say in these companies though. Industries are not accountable to us at all.” In the United States, because of the mythology around the “American dream”, we have a high degree of skepticism around the government, less around the companies. And that’s going to change for me. It’s interesting that you consider Europeans to be more trusting of governments, because many European countries are very vocal about the so-called dictates from Brussels. Maybe Europeans do trust their governments more, but at the same time there is a strong movement against the European Union. Have you encountered anything like this? When you come to a problem in Europe today, is the answer more European Union or less European Union? It is not really your government, it doesn’t function as a government, but it still does some things as a government. That leaves some weird things uncovered. Is the answer: let’s make it more of the government, so it can complete the mission many people have for it? Or let’s just keep European Union out of it? I think that’s what people really mean when they debate about European Union. It’s an unfinished experiment. Even in countries like Hungary, when you hear Viktor Orbán talk about the EU – he doesn’t actually want to get rid of European Union’s money. He just doesn’t want to feel like he has to answer for anything. I understand that there’s tension between ideal sovereignty and European Union, but if you told all the university students: “Okay, no more Erasmus,”... Yes, we would riot. That’s exactly my point. If you had to check your passports at the border every time you wanted to travel, I think people would not be very happy about that. There’s a natural tension going on, but this is ultimately a part of the democratic process. That’s true. We are still in the middle of the debate; I mean the fact that not all arguments against the EU are completely pointless. Well, when you see people lying, that’s invalid. When you have Viktor Orbán tell people that Brussels is going to take away their money and demand that they take a bunch of migrants to their villages – that’s just scare tactics. That’s not part of the democratic discussion. I think it’s totally understandable that countries would talk about sovereignty and what are the competencies of the EU and what are the competencies of the national governments. That makes total sense. Both your journalistic work and your book, Enemies Within, are described as "courageous, filled with data, greatly sourced". How do you think the sources and facts in the press change the readers’ perspective on populism or populist politicians? I think people understand that facts matter. The challenge of the media right now is how you make a sustainable business model around the fact that gathering news is expensive, complicated, and hard. Producing propaganda and lies is easy. If the facts cost money and the lies are free, and you can just blast them out to everybody – how do the facts break through? That’s one of the fundamental challenges we have in the 21^st century. What would be your answer to this question? I don’t have any! Does anybody? I think we’re all trying to figure that out. I wish I had a more obvious answer. Are you currently working on something you could tell us more about? No. (laughter) So, we just have to wait for the next Pulitzer Prizes to be announced. (laughter) Hopefully, we will put something in the newspaper. The Tatrabanka Foundation, in cooperation with the Petit Academy and Comenius University in Bratislava, organized a lecture by the American journalist as part of the Pulitzer Prize Lecture Series program. Denisa Vydumská, FiF UK

One year of the MaTeK project

Maria.Slavickova@fmph.uniba.sk — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 22:50:00 +0100

On the anniversary of one year of the MaTeK project, we have prepared a short video within the consortium, which briefly presents the project and summarizes the activities we organized in 2021. During the mentioned year, three working groups were established. They meet almost on a weekly basis and solve partial tasks related to the main research question of the project. In 2021 we have participated in several online conferences within Europe and Asia, we have organized the first project summer school in Norway and several workshops and seminars at all cooperating institutions. The twining activities that are supporting the institutional networking are well established, and we also hope for good research results. The short video summarizes project activities, and it is supplemented by comments from some summer school participants. One year of the MaTeK project - video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jcI6t5oKxg

Marie-Curie scholar from Iran: Plants have hormones, too

nasa.univerzita@uniba.sk — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 13:19:00 +0100

Where do you come from? I was born in Mashhad, a large city in northeast Iran with a population of about 3 million. Mashhad is the capital of Khorasan province and it is a well-known religious city because of its Holy Shrine Imam Reza (Editor’s note: It is the largest mosque in the world with an area of 267,079 square metres). I spent my childhood, school, high school, and bachelor years in this province. What was your childhood like? I had a great childhood and was physically active. I spent most of my free time with my sisters and brother. In the summers, we went to our farm and I planted flowers and followed butterflies. In school I was also a good student and highly motivated. Like other siblings, I was good at mathematics and science. My older sister is a nurse, my younger sister is an electrical engineer, and my brother is a civil engineer. What did you dream of becoming as a child? When I was a child, I wanted to grow and sell ornamental plants and flowers. My dream was to have my own flower farm. When I was older, I grew more interested in chemistry. Finally, I decided to study it. Where did you study chemistry? In 2006, I went to Isfahan for a master’s degree in physical chemistry at Isfahan University of Technology. I stayed in Isfahan for about 13 years. After my Master’s, I started my PhD, and after my PhD, I took a job in a private company in this city. Isfahan is a historical city in central Iran with many old buildings and bridges built based on Persian architecture. I met my husband for the first time in 2013 in the Physical Chemistry Laboratory, where we worked on our PhD theses and got married in 2018. What did your path to becoming a scientist look like? During my Master’s, I worked on the analysis and determination of some explosives by ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) and I successfully developed a direct method for diagnosing these compounds structurally. This was my first scientific experience which was very exciting for me. I felt even more pleased after the publication of my first paper for this work. This was why I was interested in science and performing scientific projects. My first work was published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials – one of the highest ranked journals in chemistry. This work with more than 170 citations is one of my best papers. What do you like about science? Science offers you something new every day, it is never boring. For those who don’t like a routine life, science and research are the best choice, as a scientist encounters new challenges every day. What is it like to be a woman scientist in Iran? Is it very common? In Iran, nearly 70% of university graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics are women. Men prefer to look for a job and moreover, they are required to attend mandatory military service for 2 years. However, in research institutes and at universities, there are more men scientists working than women. Generally, it is difficult to find a job (related to expertise) for both men and women. It is part of our social culture that the family presses the children to study at college after high school. Therefore, there are too many graduates in our country looking for work. You have joined our university for two years as you received a scholarship for your research. What will you be working on here? I am happy that now I work as a researcher at the Department of Experimental Physics at Comenius University. I want to work hard on my project on plant hormones and develop applications of ion mobility spectrometry in this field. After my postdoc on the plant hormone molecules, I would like to continue my research on detection and measurements of other molecules extracted and released from plants and flowers. I especially like to study plants with medical uses to identify the molecules that cause medical effects. Also, in the future I would like to work in a company that focuses on constructing analytical instruments, such as ion mobility and mass spectrometry. Mass spectrometry is a technique similar to IMS that is used for identification of compounds based on the mass/charge ratio of the ions produced from the compound. What kind of hormones do plants have? Are they any similar to human hormones? Plant hormones, similar to human hormones, are naturally produced within plants and influence the plant growth, seed germination, fruit maturation and fruit ripening, they have significant roles in the production of food crops. They are responsible for controlling the physiological processes including embryogenesis, regulation of the organ size, pathogen defense, and reproductive developments. How are the plant hormones measured today? Since plant hormones are produced in a very low concentration, their detection is an important issue in plant physiology studies. In recent years, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), gas chromatography (GC), and mass spectrometry (MS) techniques are reported for measuring plant hormones. Chromatography is a technique used to separate mixtures of substances into their components based on their molecular structure and molecular composition. This involves a stationary phase (a solid, or a liquid supported on a solid) and a mobile phase (a liquid or a gas). The mobile phase flows through the stationary phase and carries the components of the mixture with it. Sample components that display stronger interactions with the stationary phase will move more slowly through the column than components with weaker interactions. Hence, chromatography is a slow and expensive technique. What is your solution? We aim to introduce a fast and low-cost technique. In this project, the proposal includes the use of ion mobility spectrometry for the detection and quantification of plant hormones. IMS is an instrumental analytical method that works at atmospheric pressure. A sample is heated to vaporize and enters an ionization region. Ions are then periodically injected into a drift tube by applying successive pulses to the shutter grid. An electric field is applied all over the tube to move the ions. Ionized molecules then travel through the drift tube at speeds that are related to their mass and size. Different ions are separated in the drift tube, according to their size, mass and geometry while traveling towards the detector. Each substance produces specific ions that yield a unique spectrum. IMS instruments can be used in a range of applications including volatile organic compound (VOC) monitoring, biological sample analysis, medical diagnosis, and food quality monitoring. Analysis and response times of IMS are very short, thus providing the basis for a real-time monitoring capability. The IMS instrument used in this project has been made and developed at the Department of Experimental Physics at Comenius University. How long have you worked on this particular research? I have about 12 years’ experience working with IMS. However, the plant hormone field is new, and I have just started their measurements at Comenius University. Although I am familiar with some aspects of real sample analysis including extraction and pre-concentration, it is the first time that I want to work with plant tissues. Do you have tutors or co-workers in your field that you want to mention? Prof. Štefan Matejčík supported and helped me during all the steps of the Marie-Curie scholarship and I truly appreciate him and his group at the Department of Experimental Physics for the scientific and administrative advice. Can you tell us more about this scholarship and how you got it? The Marie-Curie scholarship supports the mobility of experienced researchers (in possession of a doctoral degree or with at least four years of research experience) through European Fellowships for 2 years. Since I’ve previously had some scientific collaborations with Prof. Matejčík’s group and I was familiar with the facilities of his laboratories, we decided that I should apply for the Marie-Curie scholarship. What are your plans after this visit here at Comenius University? I will obtain valuable knowledge and experience during my postdoc at Comenius University. Therefore, I hope to find a good position in a research institute or a university in a European country after my postdoc. Otherwise, I will go back to Iran to continue my work on developing applications of ion mobility spectrometry for different classes of compounds. Also, I intend to allocate some of my time on instrumental development of ion mobility spectrometry. Lenka Miller

PF 2022

milos.hrabovsky@uniba.sk — Wed, 22 Dec 2021 10:13:00 +0100

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2022 to all our international students.

Andrea Čalkovská, Dean

Geologists: 10 Million Years Ago, Mlynská Dolina was Underwater

pr@uniba.sk — Tue, 21 Dec 2021 11:25:00 +0100

The inland sea which the scientists named Lake Pannon had brackish water similar to the present-day Caspian Sea. It reached its maximum extent more than 10.6 million years ago, stretching from Vienna to Belgrade and Transylvania in Romania. In places it reached depths of one kilometre. Lake Pannon was later filled by Danube sediments and receded south towards Serbia, where it disappeared 4 million years ago.

"The presence of Neogene Period deposits had been known in Mlynská dolina, but the exact age or nature of the environment of these sediments has not been previously determined," says the lead author of the study, Michal Šujan from Comenius University. The staff of the Department of Geology and Palaeontology of Comenius University carried out excavation work on the slope of the university campus in Mlynská dolina. The scientists manually excavated an outcrop and observed an alternation of layers of mud deposited below the surface of the Pannonian Lake, layers of sand deposited by waves, and layers of fine gravel particles deposited by streams flowing from the Malé Karpaty Mountains, which formed a system of islands. Wave action near the bottom of the lake created dunes which resemble sand dunes formed normally in deserts by winds. "Between the strata we could clearly make out bioturbations - traces left by the animals inhabiting the Paleo-lake bottom in search of food and digging tunnels. We also found fossils of nanoplankton and Ostracods," continues Michal Šujan. "This fossil fauna indicates that the coastal areas were dynamic and fresh water was flowing in from streams. For animals, such conditions are not ideal but mildly stressful, resulting in a reduced variety of fossils," he continues. The authors dated the layers using a relatively new dating method based on the concentration of the cosmogenic nuclide Beryllium, which is being applied and improved at the Department of Geology and Palaeontology of the Faculty of Natural Sciences of Comenius University. Using this method the scientists concluded that the layers were deposited on the bottom of the ancient sea between 10.9 and 10.6 million years ago. "This type of sediment is challenging to research, because the fossils we encounter often include older species whose shells were recycled by erosion, like those deposited in the Paratethys sea which formed the Sandberg sands," concludes Michal Šujan from Comenius University.

The knowledge that the slopes of the Malé Karpaty Mountains were once shores of Lake Pannon up to the level of today's university campus tells us that the waters which used to cover the present-day Záhorská nížina and Podunajská nížina basins were once connected.

"I am pleased that our geologists and palaeontologists chose to explore the area of Mlynská dolina with which we are all familiar. The results are extremely interesting from a historic stand-point, but at the same time they allow us to better understand the uplift of Malé Karpaty Mountains. This, in turn, leads to a better knowledge of the fault movements and the potential risks for Bratislava," said the Rector of Comenius University Marek Števček. "Understanding the changes that have taken place over tens of millions of years in this area will, among other things, help us to better understand the current climate changes," he added.

The research received support of the Slovak Research and Development Agency through grants APVV-16-0121 and APVV-20-0120.

Announcement of state examination

Tue, 14 Dec 2021 17:06:00 +0100

The regular State Examination from Pharmaceutical chemistry, Pharmacology and Pharmacognosy in...

Seminar of Graph Theory - Jonathan Narboni (16.12.2021)

Martin.Skoviera@fmph.uniba.sk — Tue, 14 Dec 2021 16:51:00 +0100

Jonathan Narboni (LaBRI, Université de Bordeaux):
On the reconfiguration version of the Hadwiger conjecture MS Teams Access code for MS TEAMS je: gglxxc7
(Access code for Comenius University only)
Abstract:
The Hadwiger conjecture is one of the most famous and widely open conjecture in graph coloring. It states that a graph with no K_t-minor admits a (k-1)-coloring. In this talk we will consider a reconfiguration version of the problem. One can transform a proper coloring of a graph into another proper coloring by applying a Kempe change: ie switching the two colors of a maximal bichromatic component. Two colorings are called equivalent if there exists a sequence of Kempe changes to apply to transform the first coloring into the second. In 1981, Las Vergnas and Meyniel conjectured a reconfiguration analog of the Hadwiger conjecture: if a graph has no K_t minor, then all its k-colorings are equivalent. We disprove this conjecture, more precisely, we prove that for any epsilon, there exists t large enough such that there exists a graph with no K_t minor, that has two ((3/2-epsilon)*t)-colorings which are not equivalent. This is joint work with Marthe Bonamy, Clément Legrand-Duchesne, and Marc Heinrich.
More information

Faculty

Fri, 10 Dec 2021 22:46:00 +0100

Nuclear Seminar - Marián Ivanov (15.12.2021)

Jaroslav.Stanicek@fmph.uniba.sk — Fri, 10 Dec 2021 15:31:00 +0100

Dr. Marián Ivanov (CERN, GSI Darmstadt, University Heidelberg):
RootInteractive tool for N dimensional interactive analysis: Seeing is believing MS Teams Abstract:
ALICE, one of the four big experiments at the CERN LHC, is a detector dedicated to heavy-ion physics. A high interaction rate environment causes pile-up which necessitates the use of advanced methods of data analysis. Over the recent years machine learning (ML) has come to dominate multi-dimensional data analysis. However, it is more difficult to interpret the ML models and to evaluate their uncertainties, which are offered by classical approaches.
In this seminar we would like to present new tool RootInteractive which we recently developed within ALICE. The main goal of the tool is to simplify data analysis in many dimensions, to fit (ML regression) and visualize N dimensional function and to enable easy functional composition using non-parametric and parametric functions. Using RootInteractive tool strongly simplifies multidimensional parameter optimization, we enabled interactive expert communication within ALICE working groups. The tool is aimed not only for computer experts but is used by "standard” users (master, PhD) and for the educational purposes.
We will show how RootInteractive is used in ALICE for reconstruction, calibration, MC simulations and also preliminary physics analysis studies. In more detail, we will demonstrate how we combine ML with a parametric model, in order to yield a compact representation of physics processes. Our main use case is the calibration of space charge distortions, which requires estimates of reducible and irreducible uncertainties. We will demonstrate how this and other use cases (Particle Identification, V0/Cascade reconstruction, MC/data remapping) are solved with our approach and will describe the features of the software we developed.

Students to Compete in the Slovak Winter Universiade

pr@uniba.sk — Mon, 13 Dec 2021 13:03:00 +0100

Disciplines at the Universiade will include badminton, table tennis, headis, weightlifting, karate, futsal, crossfit, ice hockey, floorball, dance sports, downhill skiing, cross-country skiing and biathlon. Individual competitions will be held between 7 and 10 February and downhill skiing events will take place on 18 and 19 February. Cross-country skiing is scheduled for 15 and 16 January. Teams may only be made up of students from a single school, with the exception of badminton, table tennis and dance disciplines. The deadline for registrations is 21 January 2022. The registrations are preliminary and the event will depend on the pandemic situation. Conditions of participation of athletes and other information can be found at https://univerziada.uniba.sk . Any full-time university student not older than 28 years (or a graduate not more than one year after graduation) who is a holder of an ISIC card, index card or a graduation diploma can apply. International students who study at Slovak higher education institutions are also eligible for participation. Individual sport disciplines are also open to secondary school seniors. Those who study at two universities simultaneously can only enrol on behalf of one of them. Students whose study is suspended at the time of the Universiade may not participate. The Slovak Winter Universiade is supported by the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic and the Slovak Association of University Sport.