https://uniba.sk/ Najnovšie novinky sk https://uniba.sk/fileadmin/tt_news_article.gif https://uniba.sk/ Najnovšie novinky TYPO3 - get.content.right http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Thu, 31 Dec 2026 00:00:00 +0100 https://uniba.sk/ A delegation from Università degli Studi di Teramo in Italy visited the Rectorate of Comenius... [RUK] Titulka - široké novinky pr@uniba.sk Mon, 15 Jun 2026 11:54:00 +0200 http://https://www.fpharm.uniba.sk/en/education/master-study/pharmacy-in-english/the-graduation-ceremony/ The graduation ceremony of pharmacists will take place on June 24, 2026 in the Hall of the Comenius... [FaF] Titulka - široké novinky [FaF] Kalendár Wed, 10 Jun 2026 14:33:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ The course focused on the application of modern teaching approaches [FM] Titulka - úzke novinky Wed, 10 Jun 2026 13:09:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ Bratislava, 5 June 2026: The final nationwide meeting of the BIOFORD project consortium took place... “The 23rd consortium meeting marks the conclusion of a six-year project that was unique in Slovakia and the first to make a significant contribution to advancing science and research,” said Biobank Director Zuzana Danková. The project has led to progress in targeted diagnostics, personalised medicine and effective preventive measures. “For Slovakia and for our faculty, the value of biobanking lies in the ability to collect and properly preserve large numbers of samples, which can later be used to test diagnostic methods quickly. In the past, even when a new diagnostic method was available, researchers often had to wait months or even years to assemble a suitable group of patient samples. With systematic biobanking, the necessary samples can now be available within days,” said Štefan Sivák, Vice-Dean for Science and Research at JFMED CU, describing the main benefits of the project. Biobanking is an important foundation for any form of clinical research. “High-quality samples mean high-quality research results. This allows us to accelerate our understanding of various diseases, offer new diagnostic options, develop personalised therapies tailored to patients’ needs and support the development of new medicines, bringing enormous benefits for the entire population,” explained Associate Professor Danková. The JFMED CU Biobank is a nationally significant facility on a par with many biobanks abroad. “In terms of technology and automation, we are even ahead of many of them. In total, we can store seven million different samples,” Danková added. The biobank is now focusing on expanding its repositories and is involved in several major collaborations. It collects samples, for example, through nationwide screening programmes and its systematic cooperation with University Hospital Martin. These collections will be available to researchers across Europe. The BIOFORD project, co-financed by the European Union and with a budget of approximately EUR 18 million, brought together seven Slovak partners: Comenius University Bratislava, through the Jessenius Faculty of Medicine in Martin and the Faculty of Medicine in Bratislava; the Ministry of Health of the Slovak Republic; the National Cancer Institute; the University of Žilina; the Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences; the Centre of Social and Psychological Sciences of the Slovak Academy of Sciences; and the National Institute of Rheumatic Diseases. “As partners, we divided the work among ourselves and shared responsibility for advancing science and research in Slovakia,” added Associate Professor Danková.]]> [RUK] Titulka - úzke novinky [RUK] Tlačové správy pr@uniba.sk Mon, 15 Jun 2026 11:51:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ June 6, 2026, Bratislava 4 June, a working meeting took place at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, bringing together academic partners from FIIT STU and representatives of WeRide, a global leader in autonomous mobility. WeRide was represented by Hua Zhong, Senior VP of Engineering, Jennifer Li, Chief Financial Officer and Head of International, and Kevin Pan, Business Director. Representatives of the Slovak technology company DiusAi also took part in the meeting. The Faculty of Law of Comenius University in Bratislava was represented by doc. JUDr. Jozef Andraško, PhD., who presented the Faculty’s activities in the area of research into the regulation of automated mobility. He also introduced the ROAT – Regulation of Automated Transport research group, which focuses on the legal and regulatory aspects of automated transport:
https://www.flaw.uniba.sk/veda/vyskumne-skupiny/regulacia-automatizovanej-dopravy/ The main topic of this informal yet highly productive meeting was the potential development of cooperation on a pilot project for autonomous transport in Slovakia. The interconnection of technology, engineering, information technology, and law is essential for the practical deployment of autonomous vehicles. Legal and regulatory frameworks must keep pace with technological development so that new solutions can be not only innovative, but also safe, responsible, and socially acceptable. We thank all partners for an open and constructive discussion. We believe that initiatives of this kind will contribute to the development of modern, safe, and sustainable transport solutions in Slovakia.]]> [PraF] UPITPDV [PraF] Titulka - úzke novinky - z uniba.sk [PraF] Regulácia automatizovanej dopravy Fri, 05 Jun 2026 13:31:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ May 27, 2026, Bratislava “Legislative Evaluation Methodology and the Potential of Artificial Intelligence in the Legislative Process” was held at the National Council of the Slovak Republic under the auspices of Miroslav Čellár, Chair of the Constitutional and Legal Affairs Committee of the National Council of the Slovak Republic. Among the speakers was Assoc. Prof. Matúš Mesarčík from the Institute of Information Technology Law and Intellectual Property Law, Faculty of Law, Comenius University Bratislava, who delivered a presentation on “Risks and Regulation of the Use of AI in the Legislative Process.”
In his presentation, he examined the opportunities and limitations of using artificial intelligence in law-making, legislative impact assessment, and decision-support processes within public institutions. Particular attention was devoted to issues of transparency, reliability, accountability, and oversight when deploying AI systems in legislative and governmental settings.He also outlined the current European regulatory framework for artificial intelligence and discussed the importance of maintaining human oversight, safeguarding fundamental rights, and ensuring the trustworthiness of AI tools used in the legislative process. The presentation emphasized that the effective integration of AI into law-making requires not only technological innovation, but also clear governance frameworks, high-quality data, and robust risk-management mechanisms.]]> [PraF] UPITPDV Fri, 05 Jun 2026 13:45:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ May 25, 2026, Bratislava Legal Innovation Day 2026: AI in Law in Practice conference held in Prague, Assoc. Prof. Matúš Mesarčík from the Institute of Information Technology Law and Intellectual Property Law, Faculty of Law, Comenius University Bratislava, participated as a speaker. In his presentation, “How to Mitigate Risks Associated with the Use of Automated Tools in Law,” he addressed the most common risks related to the use of artificial intelligence in legal practice. He presented practical recommendations for establishing internal processes, control mechanisms, and governance rules to ensure that automated tools support informed legal decision-making while minimizing associated risks. He also emphasized the importance of human oversight, clearly defined accountability, and effective risk management when deploying AI in the provision of legal services.]]> [PraF] UPITPDV Fri, 05 Jun 2026 13:39:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ where diamond ends and something else starts 12 Pa, 10 million times higher than the normal atmospheric pressure, three times higher than the pressure at the center of the Earth) diamond should transform to the so called BC8 phase. The prediction was based on analogy with silicon but later atudies employing advanced systematic crystal structure prediction methods confirmed it entirely. BC8 is a complicated structure (figure - red atoms) which still maintains the preferred number of four bonds per carbon atom but their arrangement is more complicated, allowing a volume reduction of about 3%.  The experimental problem is serious. We need a pressure of at least 1 TPa, which is an extreme pressure that cannot be reached in a static terrestrial experiment. Currently the only possibility is the so called ramp compression which can reach pressure in the TPa range, however, only for a short time of about 10 ns.  But even reaching such pressure for a very short time might not be enough since diamond does not yield easily. Few years ago, the experiment [2] reached a pressure of 2 TPa, but surprisingly, no transition was observed. Diamond was only compressed but its structure did not change. The BC8 phase in carbon thus has not yet been experimentally observed.  Since the experiment is very challenging and costly, it is useful to perform a computer simulation. It could discover how exactly should the transformation proceed and test various possibilities that might be useful for the design of the experiment.  Currently computer simulations as well as many other branches of science and everyday life are heavily influenced by the revolution related to the application of machine learning (ML) methods. The simulations are based on the ability to compute the energy of the system (so-called potential) if we know the positions of all atoms. This can be calculated by means of quantum mechanics, but the calculation is complicated and lengthy and for systems with more than few thousands of atoms practically impossible. And here ML comes to help - it can learn e.g. the potential for carbon from a large number of examples and then compute it fast and with high accuracy  even for millions of atoms. This progress allows to substantially push the frontiers of what we can simulate.  In our work we employed the ML potential for carbon [3] developed by the group of Prof. I. Oleynik at the University of South Florida, Tampa, USA.  By means of  metadynamics [4] and molecular dynamics we first simulated transitions induced by high pressure from the cubic diamond phase. We observed that in the initial stage a disordered droplet is formed, representing supercooled liquid. Within a short time the droplet crystallizes to BC8 which subsequently gradually grows and finally fills the whole system. Cubic diamond, however, is not the only diamond phase of carbon. Another phase, hexagonal diamond (lonsdaleite) is found in Nature, albeit quite rarely. In our work we simulated for the first time also the transition from this phase (figure). The result was surprising - the transition proceeded similarly to the case of cubic diamond, but substantially faster. Since time plays in the ramp compression method a crucial role, because the high pressure is reached only for a very short time, using hexagonal diamond as initial material might be a better choice. We also simulated decompression of BC8 to atmospheric pressure and found that this exotic phase could possibly survive quenching to ambient conditions and exist as a metastable phase.  The work [5] which is the result of a collaboration with the group of Prof. I. Oleynik, was on 1 June 2026 published in the journal Phys. Rev. B Letters (belongs to Nature index) and will be useful for the design of future experiments aiming at the synthesis of BC8. The research at the Comenius University was supported by the grants APVV-19-0371 and APVV-23-0515. References [1] M. T. Yin, Si-III (BC-8) crystal phase of Si and C: Structural properties, phase stabilities, and phase transitions, Phys. Rev. B 30, 1773 (1984). [2] A. Lazicki, D. McGonegle, J. R. Rygg, D. G. Braun, D. C. Swift, M. G. Gorman, R. F. Smith, P. G. Heighway, A. Higginbotham, M. J. Suggit, et al., Metastability of diamond ramp-compressed to 2 terapascals, Nature (London) 589, 532 (2021). [3] J. T. Willman, K. Nguyen-Cong, A. S. Williams, A. B. Belonoshko, S. G. Moore, A. P. Thompson, M. A. Wood, and I. I. Oleynik, Machine learning interatomic potential for simulations of carbon at extreme conditions, Phys. Rev. B 106, L180101 (2022). [4] A. Laio and M. Parrinello, Escaping free-energy minima, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 99, 12562 (2002). [5] Roman Martoňák, Sergey Galitskiy, Azat Tipeev, Joseph M. Gonzalez, and Ivan I. Oleynik, From diamond to BC8 to simple cubic and back: Kinetic pathways to post-diamond carbon phases from metadynamics, Phys. Rev. B 113, L220101 (2026).

]]> [FMFI] Veda [FMFI] Titulka - úzke novinky Roman.Martonak@fmph.uniba.sk Mon, 08 Jun 2026 15:47:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ An international research team led by Daniel Jablonski from the Faculty of Natural Sciences,... Gloydius, venomous snakes belonging to the viper family. The study revealed that what science had long considered a single species in fact consists of five distinct evolutionary lineages. The key to solving the puzzle lay both in museums and in regions that remained inaccessible for decades The discovery was based on a combination of DNA collected during fieldwork and historical material preserved in natural history museums. The researchers succeeded in extracting genetic data from specimens collected in the 19th and early 20th centuries, including the original type specimen of the Himalayan pit viper, collected more than 160 years ago and now housed at the Natural History Museum in London. “The Himalaya and the Hindu Kush harbour an overlooked vertebrate diversity,” explains Daniel Jablonski from the Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University Bratislava, who has been conducting long-term research on amphibians and reptiles in Afghanistan and Pakistan. “By combining modern field sampling with data from historical museum specimens, we uncovered evolutionary lineages that had remained hidden for more than a century after the original description of the Himalayan pit viper.” The analysis of multiple data sources identified five distinct species-level lineages. These include the originally described Himalayan pit viper, Gloydius himalayanus, G. chambensis, described in 2022, and three previously unknown species named after the regions where they occur: G. hazarensis from the western Himalaya, G. hindukushensis from the eastern Hindu Kush, and G. nepalensis from Nepal. These lineages differ to varying degrees in their genetics, morphology, anatomy and geographical distribution. The invaluable role of museum collections The study highlights the enduring scientific value of natural history collections as essential infrastructure for future biodiversity research. Some of the evidence that enabled researchers to resolve these evolutionary and taxonomic questions had been preserved in museums for more than a century. Only modern analytical methods made it possible to recognise these differences and answer the questions they raised. The research also involved experts with extensive experience in Himalayan biodiversity, snake systematics and historical museum collections. Sylvia Hofmann from Museum Koenig in Bonn has spent more than three decades studying the evolution and biogeography of Himalayan fauna, particularly amphibians from Nepal and Tibet. Frank Tillack from the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin is a recognised specialist in reptile taxonomy, morphology and historical collections. Snakes of the genus Gloydius are adapted to the demanding environments of the Himalaya and Hindu Kush, although they also occur elsewhere in Asia. As predators of small vertebrates, they form an important part of mountain ecosystems. Their true diversity in South Asia, however, has remained largely unknown because of their rarity and the difficult terrain in which they occur. The study therefore provides not only a new perspective on a particular group of venomous snakes, but also broader insights into the evolution of animals in one of the world’s most complex and highest mountain regions. A challenge for conservation and future research The high mountain regions of South Asia remain full of biological surprises, yet they are also affected by socio-political instability that often complicates or even prevents field research. At the same time, South Asia is among the most densely populated parts of the world, and pressure on natural habitats is increasing even in otherwise remote areas. The discovery therefore carries an important message for biodiversity conservation and future research. Scientists still do not fully understand how these species evolved or whether gene flow continues between them. “People often speak about biodiversity research in broad and sometimes dismissive terms, but in reality, it is about precise scientific knowledge of specific organisms and their evolutionary history,” says Jablonski. “This study shows that even a name known for a very long time can conceal several distinct species with their own evolutionary histories and restricted distributions. South Asia brings together two extremes: extraordinarily rich biodiversity that remains undescribed, and intense pressure from a rapidly growing human population. If we do not recognise species, we cannot study them properly or protect them effectively.” The study demonstrates that fundamental biodiversity research is not science for its own sake. On the contrary, it can significantly improve our understanding of Earth’s history and, in the case of venomous snakes, may also have practical applications. “This research is far from over. The mountains and valleys of Central and South Asia influence a large part of the world, and the evolutionary stories recorded there are also part of the story of our own species,” concludes Daniel Jablonski. Daniel Jablonski’s research is supported by an EU NextGenerationEU fellowship through the Slovak Recovery and Resilience Plan under project No. 09I03-03-V04-00306 and by VEGA grant 1/0391/25. This study was published in the scientific journal ZooKeys. Image 1: Evolutionary relationships and distribution of five pit viper species in the Himalaya and Hindu Kush. The upper right corner shows a historical illustration of the type specimen from 1864. (Credit: Dr Daniel Jablonski, Licence: CC BY 4.0) Image 2: Paratypes of two newly described species: Gloydius hindukushensis from north-western Pakistan (left) and Gloydius nepalensis from Nepal (right). (Credit: Dr Daniel Jablonski and Dr Frank Tillack, Licence: CC BY 4.0) Image 3: Osteological research – 3D anatomy of the skull of the original type specimen of the Himalayan pit viper, collected more than 160 years ago. (Credit: Kristin Mahlow-Tillack, Licence: CC BY 4.0)]]> [RUK] Titulka - široké novinky [RUK] Tlačové správy pr@uniba.sk Fri, 12 Jun 2026 12:20:00 +0200 https://uniba.sk/ In May 2026, representatives of Comenius University Bratislava took part in several international... Support for Projects Promoting Higher Education Institutions Abroad – Stage 2.]]> [RUK] Titulka - široké novinky pr@uniba.sk Thu, 04 Jun 2026 12:52:00 +0200