25.11.2015 change 25.11.2015

Scientists: Mobility is necessary in the work of contemporary researcher

Photo: Fotolia Photo: Fotolia

While in Poland, the sciences and life sciences are at a high level, the trips abroad are necessary for researchers to see how others are doing science - told PAP Prof. Mariusz Jaskólski. Scientist simply has to be mobile - added a PhD student at University College London, Kira Kempińska.

"Today science in Poland is at a very high level, it is really good. At least in those areas that I know and I represent: the sciences and life sciences. We have made tremendous progress. Trips and contacts, however, are needed in order to see how others are doing science. If we want to be in the lead, we need to travel, meet, leave, do postdoc fellowships" - told PAP Prof. Mariusz Jaskolski from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań.

In the 80s he moved to the United States to begin work in the new crystallographic laboratory founded by Dr. Alexander Wlodawer at the US National Cancer Institute. Their joint research led to the determination of the first structure of the protein of the HIV retrovirus. As a result, seven years later the first rationally designed drug against HIV was introduced.

"I went believing that I would do the things that I had are already done in Poland. I thought that it was not necessary to leave. I was an unusual example of a scientist who had never been on a long postdoctoral fellowship. It was the 1980s - the worst period - and I thought that we could do a lot in Poland. We actually did great work, but only after I pulled my head above water, I saw how the world looks. It turned out that we were doing little things after all" - said Prof. Jaskólski.

According to the Polish researcher Kira Kempińska from University College London, a contemporary researcher must be mobile. "This is the foundation of scientific work. Unfortunately, we compete with each other on a global scale, so anything you achieve locally does not matter if someone has already done that on another continent. Firstly, we must know what others are doing, and secondly we need to speak the same language" - explains the Polish researcher, who works in a team analysing the so-called. big data to reduce crime.

In the UK - as she says - doctoral students are even required to attend international conferences. "You gain confidence, and your work is gaining value internationally. This also provokes to create projects on the border between different fields and to be innovative. In my department, we have people from many disciplines looking at the phenomenon of crime. My background is mathematics, but we also have biologists, chemists who deal with fingerprints. Only on the border of these disciplines innovation is formed. A scientist must be mobile, flexible and speaking in languages of various fields" - noted Kempińska.

Agata Staniewicz fom the University of Bristol noted that especially young scientists must be prepared to travel. "At the beginning you have to be ready for travelling. Once you already have an established career and your own research group, then you can send other people" - added Staniewicz.

"I send all my people for a mandatory post-doctoral foreign trip. If after that they are still good and want to do science, we will welcome them back with open arms. However, this one of the shortcomings. The organization of our science is not very good. We do not know how to pick out good people, but abroad they can do it perfectly" - noted Prof. Jaskólski.

Prof. Wiesław Nowiński, who almost a quarter-century ago created computer maps the brain in the Agency for Science, Technology and Research in Singapore, admitted that he would like to create in Poland the conditions in which scientists would not have to live out of a suitcase. "If they go somewhere, it should be because of meetings, cooperation, possibly unique hardware, and because they are facing a barrier and are unable to continue to develop in Poland" - noted Prof. Nowiński in an interview with PAP.

PAP - Science and Scholarship in Poland, Ewelina Krajczyńska

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