Team Skoltech (from left to right): Nadezhda Volovich, Evgeniya Korotchenko and Ksenia Ershova.
Skoltech students, Nadezhda Volovich, Evgeniya Korotchenko and Ksenia Ershova, took part in the 1st student Biological tournament organized by Lomonosov MSU. During the 4 – day tournament participants were presenting their solutions for different problems in the fields of biology and biomedicine, analyzing the presented solutions of opposing teams and participating in scientific discussion. The aim of the tournament was to attract students to the practical scientific work in the field of biology and biomedicine, development of the ability to solve complex biological problems, to provide solutions and to defend them in scientific discussions (Biological fight).
Apart from the students, Skoltech was also represented at the judges’ panel, with Svetlana Dubiley, head of biomedical teaching laboratory at the center for Data-Intensive Biomedicine and Biotechnology, and Dmitry Artamonov, the facilitator of the same center.
At the tournament itself, that took place in MSU’s Faculty of Biology, team Skoltech took the 4th place in overall scoring as well as third place diploma in team classification and third place diploma in personal classification for two members of the team, Ksenia Ershova and Nadezhda Volovich.
Discussion of a problem “Without Electrophoresis”. Ksenia Ershova as a reviewer. On the left an opponent from Siberian State Medical University.
Nadezhda commented after the event: “It was an interesting experience for us. The problems were chosen in such way that you have to look through lots of information and still use your imagination and experience in science in general. Not only was your knowledge evaluated but also the ability to analyze the others’ solutions as well as to perform and defend your own. The teams came to the tournament from all over Russia, with the exception of one team from Kazakhstan, Nazarbayev University. They are nice guys and they had the same problem as we did – it was hard to recall the terms in Russian, as their education is completely in English, like ours.
The tournament was well-organized and the judges (from different Universities) were asking interesting questions or even adding some crucial details to our discussions as the problem was related to their field of interest. Hope to try again next year with new bio students and obtaine experience in this genre of competitions!”
