ALLEA General Assembly has elected new Board during videoconference with the dellegates of ALLEA member academies on June 3, 2020. Professor Paweł Rowiński, vice president of the Polish Academy of Sciences, has been re-elected a Board Member. Congratulations!
Regenerative medicine seems to hold promise for the treatment of many serious diseases. So far, its effectiveness has been confirmed only in few cases. Despite this, commercial clinics – guided by profit motive – offer unproven cell and gene-based therapies. Such unethical practices put patients at risk. European academies of sciences address this increasing problem in their latest report.
„I fear that my generation will be the last to experience the stable climate” – says in the movie trailer Prof. Szymon Malinowski, who has been warning of the coming climate catastrophe for years. The documentary is available from 1-7 June, 2020 on the YouTube channel.
On May 27th there started an online workshop aimed at preparing scientists to apply for ERC grants. The workshop, organized by the Polish Academy of Sciences, was taught by the top Dutch consulting company Yellow Research and gathered around 120 scientists.
The recommendation to stay at home, introduced in Poland six weeks ago, resulted in a considerable curbing of the COVID-19 epidemic. The reproduction number R (which measures the average number of persons that are infected by an infected individual) has decreased in Poland and is currently at the level of 1.02-1.04. Obviously, it would be highly desirable if this index were lower than 1.0, which would mean that the epidemic is in retreat. At this moment, however, the epidemic in Poland remains at a comparable, though rather low-intensity level.
Early identification and intervension may help to reduce the impact of dyslexia for the child’s future. Katarzyna Chyl, a PhD student from the Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology runs an intriguing research studies on dyslexia.
In the recent years, there has been a growing number of scientific reports on the interactions between metal ions and peptides in the body with Alzheimer's disease or type 2 diabetes. Molecular aspects of these interactions still remain to be elucidated. Researchers around the world, including team of Prof. Wojciech Bal from the PAS Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics, are working hard to fill the knowledge gaps. His group has found that the mechanism by which the copper ions bind to proteins and the time involved are different than previously thought.
Heavy rainfalls are common on the Indonesian island. Landslides and floods make up over 50% of all natural disasters there. It turns out that extreme phenomena can be predicted with greater accuracy. Dariusz Baranowski, PhD from the PAS Institute of Geophysics carries out research on this subject. His team's findings has just been published in the prestigious Nature Communications journal.
Developing of the COVID-19 lateral flow test kits. Understanding how SARS-CoV-2 works at the molecular level. These are examples of projects that will be implemented at the institutes of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS) thanks to the funding from the National Science Center (NCN).
"Hot July leads to frosts in January", " From the Saint Anne Day evenings and mornings will be cooler", " For Saint Wit crops will flourish". Such folk sayings are an expression of the collective wisdom of many generations. For hundreds of years, they helped farmers and sailors to predict the weather. But are they still valid? Scientists analyzed the proverbs’ accuracies.
New ultra-fast test for detecting SARS-CoV-2 virus is expected to be ready for validation by the end of this year. The Scope Fluidics, whose co-founder and CEO is Prof. Piotr Garstecki from the PAS Institute of Physical Chemistry, is working on it.
Two patients connected to one ventilator – it's possible thanks to the Ventil device, which for the last month has been tested on pair of pigs. If trials with animals prove successful, the ventilator splitter can be used in humans. This is extremely important during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is organized by the National Science Center (NCN) in cooperation with the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). Researchers may submit applications by May 26, 2020.
Over the years many riverbeds have been shortened, drainage ditches have been built, peat lands and swamps have been drained in Poland. All these actions accelerate water runoff from the land. "Now, the past investments have the opposite effect than we desire" – estimates hydrologist Prof. Paweł Rowiński, Vice President of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS).
As a result of COVID-19 pandemic, apart from the medical staff, scientists have found themselves in the centre of everyone’s attention. Both these sectors, underfinanced in Poland for years, do all in their powers to get the country through the pandemic at a possibly lowest cost. What will happen with health care and science once the pandemic in over? Will both these sectors remain under chronic financial collapse?
The first remote meeting of the expert team advising on climate change is behind us. Scientists will deal with the water issue and drought in Poland in the first place.
The project aims to develop a new strategy of group testing in SARS-CoV-2 diagnostics. The method can be used to quickly examine residents and staff of a particular nursing home, or patients and medical professionals of a given hospital unit.
Research integrity remains crucial in the COVID-19 crisis, given the need for robust, evidence-based conclusions, according to the European Network of Research Integrity Offices (ENRIO).
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