Dr. Joanna Bagniewska won the finals of the third Polish edition of FameLab, which took place on Saturday 10th May in Warsaw Copernicus Science Centre. In June, she will represent Poland in the world finals of the competition.
Known almost all over the world, FameLab competition resembles TV talent shows. Instead of singers, dancers and equilibrists, competitors are physicists, engineers, biotechnologists and other researchers in the field of science. Scientists participating in the competition have three minutes to comprehensibly talk about an important research issue.
Dr. Bagniewska, who works at Nottingham Trent University, explained how the body recognizes night time and time we can relax. What is the role of melatonin in this process, and whether danger lurks for sleeping men.
She won the prize of PLN 30 thousand for research, and 5 thousand for her own expenses. She will also represent Poland in the international finals in Cheltenham in the UK, which will be held in early June.
The jury awarded second place in the competition to Justyna Lesiak, how to fight cancer cells with bacteria that have certain exceptional properties. She also received the audience award and two special awards from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education and BASF.
The last place on the podium took Tomasz Jakubek, also awarded by BASF and BMW. BASF gave another award to Dr. Barbara Pietrzak.
Other finalists on stage during the final gala were Tomila Łojewska, Mariana Kozłowska, Malwina Roszkowska-Chojecka, Michał Kępa, Natalia Woźniak and Damian Sojka .
The winners were selected by the jury composed of world-renowned astrophysicist - Prof. Marek Abramowicz, cultural expert - Dr. Jacek Wasilewski, deputy director of the Copernicus Science Centre, journalist and science populariser - Irena Cieślińska, journalist and publicist - Piotr Najsztub.
"The communication between scientists and society should be as good as it can be. This need is visible not only in Poland, considering that FameLab is organised in so many countries" - said Deputy Minister of Science Daria Lipińska-Nałęcz during the competition gala.
FameLab was created in 2005 in the UK by the organizers of the Cheltenham Science Festival. Today, FameLab editions are held in 27 countries in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas. The winner of the first Polish edition Monika Koperska took second place in the world finals in the UK and won the audience award. Last year\'s winner Dr. Marcin Stolarski won a place in the top ten in the world finals.
PAP - Science and Scholarship in Poland
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