What do mathematics and the fashion have in common? Models. They represent the reality, for example… evolution of crocodile populations. Why have crocodiles survived millions of years while other dinosaur genera died out? Possibly thanks to the temperature sex determination. Usually the sex of the hatchling is determined by genes during conception. However, for crocodiles […]
Read more "See You Later, Alligator!"Why should Poland adopt the Euro? Former foreign minister Radek Sikorski offers a culinary argument. “I think that this is a situation captured well by an American proverb”, he says: “if you are not at the table, you are on the menu”. In other words, he suggests that Poland’s adoption of the common currency would […]
Read more "At the Table Or On the Menu?"What is memory anyway? Can it be thought of as a pattern of neuronal activity, tracked down to individual cells making up the brain? Or is it fundamentally inscrutable and forever doomed to remain the topic of philosophical treatises? Recent scientific advances have made it possible to directly observe, and even to manipulate memories in […]
Read more "How Does the Brain Store Memory?"Much to the dislike of germaphobes, bacteria are everywhere, around and inside us. They account for nearly 3% of our body mass and are necessary for healthy digestion or immunity – they are our best weapon to fight their pathogenic cousins. The popular phrase ‘gut feeling’ may have more scientific basis that we realise as […]
Read more "Hidden Secrets of The Ribosome How to Hijack Sporulation in Bacteria"Have you ever visited a palace, stately home or museum, and wondered how its inhabitants might have lived in the past? Have you stepped into its ballroom and imagined the swish of skirts twirling across the dance floor? Or into the dining room and wondered what delicacies the guests sitting around the table might have […]
Read more "Reading Memoirs – A Window into 18th Century Poland"Once upon a time there was an organism, a pretty healthy, perfectly functioning organism. Sharing the same genetic material in a form of DNA inside, the cells of this organism were properly differentiated and performing their functions as well as they could. However, the organism has been exposed to a large variety of factors, sometimes […]
Read more "A Tale Of Two Cells: How Your Immune System Can Chat With Your Cancer"People have been gazing at the night sky ever since the beginning of civilisation to understand the laws governing its intricate structure of shimmer and colour. First astronomers used their bare eyes to record and analyse the motion of celestial bodies, fascinated by the nature of objects beyond human reach. Today, we are the exact […]
Read more "Understanding the Unimaginable A Dive Into Extragalactic Astronomy"What do you know about lasers? I’m quite sure that you heard enough about them to list their several applications. But did you know laser light can also manipulate a liquid? This topic is connected with my doctoral research, which in general aims to create potential applications of photonic vortices. Very strange name, but the […]
Read more "Laser Induced Crystallization: A Short Story About the Unique Phenomenon"Is it possible to save the environment and improve lives with something so small you cannot even see? Well apparently it is and we can even save money and, more importantly, save time while doing it. But let’s start from the beginning… In 1931 researchers started to work on self- assembling materials which can be […]
Read more "The Beauty of Smart Nanomaterials – Molecularly Imprinted Polymers"Words, words, words… Can you imagine our world without words? Neither can I. Words matter but sometimes we do not realise what an important role they are playing, especially when we discuss approaches of mass communication. What about Loesje? Loesje is an international foundation, which was set up in the 1980s in the Netherlands to […]
Read more "How Loesje Posters are Changing the World"