PetrSU Hosted the International Russian-Norwegian School in Marine Biotechnology and Biochemistry



21 September 2018
PetrSU held the School in the year of the 25-year anniversary of the cooperation in the Barents region and the 50-year anniversary of the Arctic University of Norway (Tromso, Norway).

PetrSU held the School in the year of the 25-year anniversary of the cooperation in the Barents region and the 50-year anniversary of the Arctic University of Norway (Tromso, Norway).

Students of Petrozavodsk State University and the Arctic University of Norway had a unique chance to attend lectures read by specialists from different Arctic regions – Norway, Murmansk, Karelia and Moscow.

The school is the result of cooperation between the Arctic University, PetrSU and the Institute of Biology of the Karelian Research Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences. According to the Vice-Rector for International Affairs Marina Gvozdeva, PetrSU as the Flagship University of Karelia plays the integrating role by uniting at its premises students, teachers and scientists from the Arctic regions of Russia and Europe.

“For our guests this school is an opportunity to receive intellectual boost and learn modern skills, as well as learn about the land, see the sights, experience living in a different culture.

The school is held in the English language, and this is yet another impetus for PetrSU students to join the international academic community.

We hold many such short-term schools, where students receive unique knowledge and teachers get a chance to work in an international environment. This is also an enormous contribution to the strategic project Soft Security. We are working on the arrangements, test formats and platforms, which will allows us reaching the soft security in 2019,” said Marina Gvozdeva.

 

Today the capacities of the Arctic region, including biological, are widely discussed. This year three regions of Karelia were included in the Arctic region: Belomorsky, Loukhsky, and Kemsky. PetrSU too focuses on the Arctic studies.

The head of the Norwegian student team Ekaterina Mishchenko notes:

“Marine biotechnology, closely related to marine biochemistry, can reinforce the biological capacities in the northern seas. They are inhabited by organisms with unique features, for instance, chemical compound. The compounds we have obtained from marine organisms can have potency that can be used in disease treatment, production of dietary supplements as well as in industrial processes such as enzymatic waste treatment. The research areas are numerous. Of course in the framework of the school it is impossible to cover everything, but we will discuss the key areas, which can be further extended and developed.”

Alongside studying, lectures, seminars and discussions, the participants of the school have been on two excursions to the Kivach Falls and the Akulovka fish farm, where the employees of the Laboratory of Ecological Biochemistry of the Institute of Biology of the Karelian Research Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences carry out their research.

At the fish farm the students were introduced to the project on the estimation of efficiency of a unique Russian antioxidant used for increasing the produce of trout farms in the northwestern Russia.

At the nature reserve Kivach the students learned how scientists preserve and restore populations of salmonids and freshwater pearl mussels.

During the school the students studied proteins of marine organisms, enzymes of cold-resistant marine organists, lipids, namely omega-3 fatty acids. Marine technologies were another focus of the school. The students and teachers discussed the opportunities of marine organisms, extraction of nutrients, and the use of cold-resistant marine organisms for human needs.

 Department of International Projects and Programs

Address:
Academic building No.1 (ul. Anokhina, 20), room 406

Phone(s):
(814-2) 71-96-14

alexey.a.rogozin@gmail.com

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