Internationally Renowned Researchers Attracted to the HSE
On June 15th two new international laboratories which are part of the HSE Institute for Statistical Studies and Economics of Knowledge, the Laboratory for Economics of Innovation headed by Ian Miles, and the Laboratory for Science and Technology Studies headed by Jean Guinet, were presented at the HSE.
‘As you know, our university has started creating a network of research laboratories as we continue to attract internationally renowned researchers’, Leonid Gokhberg, Director of the HSE Institute for Statistical Studies and Economics of Knowledge, told the audience in his welcome speech. ‘The two laboratories which we are presenting today have been created to study science, technology and innovation. This is a very important step for us as we move towards the cutting edge of international studies in this area. I am particularly proud of the fact that the laboratories are headed by our long-term friends and colleagues, whose names are well-known in the international academic community. We are planning to organize the laboratories’ work so that it involves the participation of both experienced and novice researchers, both postgraduate and undergraduate students of the HSE. This work has already started, and over the past months has progressed well’.
The Laboratory for Economics of Innovation will be headed by Ian Miles – a prominent British researcher and Professor at the University of Manchester, who participated in the realization of European Commission framework programmes dedicated to the study of innovations in the public sector and industry and foresight of European regional and technological development. According to Professor Miles, the Laboratory will carry out comparative studies of innovative policies, the study of innovative activity of enterprises and institutions as well as new technologies and markets. In addition to this, much attention will be paid to the study of society’s reaction to innovations, the innovative behaviour of consumers and the effect of this on the development and implementation of innovations.
 |
| Ian Miles |
Together with Professor Miles, another foreign academic will work in the laboratory - Thomas Gstraunthaler, who specialises in research and consulting in finance and audit. The area of his responsibility at the laboratory will be the study of innovation investment mechanisms which are prominent in developed countries as venture capital funds and other investment organizations, but are still poorly used in Russia. Thomas Gstraunthaler previously worked at the Higher School of Economics as a visiting professor from March till October 2010.
Jean Guinet, Head of the Laboratory for Science and Technology Studies, is best known for his work at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). He started writing analytical papers for the OECD as long ago as the 1970s, and more recently he has been working as Head of the OECD Directorate for Science Technology and Industry Country Studies and Outlook Division and leading the monitoring of technology and innovative policy in various countries. Incidentally, the most recent of these monitoring reviews was dedicated to Russia.
 |
| Jean Guinet |
Jean Guinet’s deputy head of the laboratory – Dirk Meissner (PhD from the Technical University of Dresden) also has a particular interest in foresight. In addition to teaching and research, for more than ten years he has been consulting in innovation management, industrial policy, R&D and other areas related to technology development.
The heads of both international laboratories emphasized that their work will not be hidden from other university staff members: quite the contrary, they are relying on interaction with other HSE departments and researchers. Leonid Gokhberg mentioned this in his speech. ‘It will be interesting to see how our colleagues react to this new level of research which will be taking place in these laboratories, we shall be absolutely open for cooperation with other laboratories and research centers of the HSE and ready to attract undergraduate and postgraduate students who are interested in this area of research. We will shortly be selecting more new staff for our laboratories’.
Oleg Seregin, HSE News Service
Photos by Nikita Benzoruk
See also:
'We Wanted to Create an Opportunity for Intercampus Teams to Engage in Promising Studies'
HSE University has announced the winners of the Project Competition in Basic Science Research for Intercampus Departments. The competition, which the university is organising for the first time, will provide funding to 10 research teams working on five topics. Four of the winning projects will be implemented by new research departments formed as a result of the competition.
Research Reveals RNA's Role in Cancer Progression
An international group of scientists and medical specialists, including HSE researchers, examined the role played by microRNA (miRNA) and long non-coding RNAs on the progression of ovarian cancer. Having analysed more than a hundred tumour samples, they found that miRNA can prevent cell mutation while long non-coding RNAs have the opposite effect of enabling such mutations. These findings can help design new drugs which act by regulating miRNA concentrations. The study was published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences.
‘We Managed to Bring Together Specialists in AI, Pure Mathematics, and Neurobiology’
In early September, the HSE University Faculty of Computer Science hosted the international conference Computer Methods of Cognitome Analysis. The event was organised by the International Laboratory of Algebraic Topology and Its Applications at the faculty.
Russian Researchers Propose New Approach to Studying Facial Emotion Recognition
Researchers of the HSE University and the Southern Federal University (SFedU) have tested a new method for studying the perception of facial emotional expressions. They suggest that asking subjects to recognise emotional expressions from dynamic video clips rather than static photographs can improve the accuracy of findings, eg in psychiatric and neurological studies. The paper is published in Applied Sciences.
Academics Started Working Even More During the Pandemic
Academics’ work week became even longer during the pandemic. This is true of researchers from different countries, independently of their gender and specialisation, an international research team with HSE University participation found. Their working time during the pandemic was 51 hours compared to the usual 40. The increased number of working hours per week seems to have become part of the new academic norm. The results of the study were published in the Plos One journal.
HSE Researchers Develop New Method for Analysing Genetic Admixture of Populations
Researchers of the HSE International Laboratory of Statistical and Computational Genomics together with their international colleagues have proposed a new statistical method for analysing population admixture that makes it possible to determine the time and number of migration waves more accurately. The history of Colombians and Mexicans (descendants of Native Americans, Spaniards and Africans) features two episodes of admixture that occurred about 350 and 200 years ago for Mexicans and 400 and 100 years ago for Colombians. The results were published in the Plos Genetics journal.
Scholars from Moscow and Vladivostok Join Efforts to Study Institutes and Preferences in Economic Behaviour
Applications from HSE departments for the ‘Mirror Laboratories’ open project competition are open until May 20. One of the ‘mirror laboratories’ successfully operating today was created as a result of a similar competition in 2020 by economists from HSE University and Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU) to study institutes and preferences in economic behaviour. Alexis Belianin, Head of the HSE International Laboratory for Experimental and Behavioural Economics, talked about how peers from Moscow and Vladivostok collaborate.
Stress Disorders More Prevalent among Doctors due to the Pandemic
Psychologists from HSE University have joined their peers from Ekaterinburg to look into the impact of the pandemic on the mental health of Russian doctors. They found that medical staff are suffering from stress, anxiety, and depression more often than before. The results of the study were published in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.
International Laboratory of Landscape Ecology Opens at HSE University
The laboratory will be led by Robert Sandlersky, a specialist in energy and mass transfer and the study of other properties of landscapes via satellite imagery and Senior Research Fellow at the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The HSE News Service spoke to Robert about the laboratory’s future activities.
New International Laboratory to Study Lighting Flashes and Volcanic Lightning
HSE University has launched a new International Laboratory for the Study and Assessment of Dangerous Geophysical Phenomena. Alexander Kostinskiy, Head of the Laboratory and Deputy Director of HSE MIEM, explains the laboratory’s future work, its important research and practical applications, and the role of international cooperation in the new laboratory.