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In Ukrainian with English subtitles.
These people are my colleagues, I used the material brought from Vernadsky Station in several papers.
In Ukrainian with English subtitles.
These people are my colleagues, I used the material brought from Vernadsky Station in several papers.
New GBIF dataset
Oct. 18th, 2025 11:40 pmAnother one is out under our rotifer project: https://www.gbif.org/dataset/36c840bb-6a98-4c8c-bd29-0b84b426b95c
I truly put my soul into this work, because behind every sample lies a story — and people I hold dear, including those who have already departed from this world.
Dear Dr. Eleonora Ovander-Sedysheva, the work of your entire scientific career is no longer lost; it will now serve hundreds of people for many years to come.
I truly put my soul into this work, because behind every sample lies a story — and people I hold dear, including those who have already departed from this world.
Dear Dr. Eleonora Ovander-Sedysheva, the work of your entire scientific career is no longer lost; it will now serve hundreds of people for many years to come.
This month the first public outcome of our project is ready, a huge GBIF database on rotifers that live in soil, moss and lichens:
https://www.gbif.org/dataset/0190c60e-e4fe-444d-b0f3-3be8368c2e0a
GBIF server liked it so much that their Secretariat sent us a message saying they'll make a special announce about it on Twitter.
https://www.gbif.org/dataset/0190c60e-e4fe-444d-b0f3-3be8368c2e0a
GBIF server liked it so much that their Secretariat sent us a message saying they'll make a special announce about it on Twitter.
"...A wild male Sumatran orangutan named Rakus was observed applying sap and chewed leaves from a medicinal plant to his facial wound. This is believed to be the first documented case of a wild animal actively using a medicinal plant to treat an injury."
The paper published last year in Nature:
Active self-treatment of a facial wound with a biologically active plant by a male Sumatran orangutan
The paper published last year in Nature:
Active self-treatment of a facial wound with a biologically active plant by a male Sumatran orangutan
Science in troubled times
Mar. 23rd, 2025 10:14 amScience in times of war.
Somehow the first person I remember when I think of it is Karl Wulfert, a German naturalist who was living and working near Leipzig right from the start of WWII (1939) and through the whole war till the end of it.
For example, here's one of his papers "Die Rädertiere der deutschen Thermen" (Rotifers of German Thermal Springs) https://www.zobodat.at/pdf/Lotos_88_0246-0262.pdf
Breslau (Wrocław, Poland) and Karlsbad (Karlovy Vary, Czechia) are yet German territory. On the map in the paper there aren't any borders (only German, Czech and Polish toponyms). The war however is at its top - ongoing Leningrad blockade, The Battle of Stalingrad (a turning point) is about to happen. More than a million people are being killed in Auschwitz, a complex of German concentration camps near the Polish town Oświęcim.
And a nice quiet German gentleman is traveling around the ponds and springs with a sampler and hydrobiological net, catching microscopic life and describing new species of animals.
I wonder how much thought he was giving to other things around him.
Somehow the first person I remember when I think of it is Karl Wulfert, a German naturalist who was living and working near Leipzig right from the start of WWII (1939) and through the whole war till the end of it.
For example, here's one of his papers "Die Rädertiere der deutschen Thermen" (Rotifers of German Thermal Springs) https://www.zobodat.at/pdf/Lotos_88_0246-0262.pdf
Breslau (Wrocław, Poland) and Karlsbad (Karlovy Vary, Czechia) are yet German territory. On the map in the paper there aren't any borders (only German, Czech and Polish toponyms). The war however is at its top - ongoing Leningrad blockade, The Battle of Stalingrad (a turning point) is about to happen. More than a million people are being killed in Auschwitz, a complex of German concentration camps near the Polish town Oświęcim.
And a nice quiet German gentleman is traveling around the ponds and springs with a sampler and hydrobiological net, catching microscopic life and describing new species of animals.
I wonder how much thought he was giving to other things around him.
(no subject)
Mar. 19th, 2025 07:16 pm"Глаза не видят факта, пока в голове нет [его] идеи - The eyes don't see the fact when there's no idea of it in the head"
The favourite saying of Dr Pavel Kilochitsky, an invertebrate zoologist and one of my favourite university professors (now deceased)
Another thing to say about spaces between bits. We don't know about so many things, because we don't see them, and we don't see them, because we don't have an idea that they may exist.
The favourite saying of Dr Pavel Kilochitsky, an invertebrate zoologist and one of my favourite university professors (now deceased)
Another thing to say about spaces between bits. We don't know about so many things, because we don't see them, and we don't see them, because we don't have an idea that they may exist.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/07/science/frozen-rotifers-siberia.html
The NY Times report on our paper is still there on the web. Starting from the next week, I'm re-taking my job at the university, at the same table I missed so much, haha (seriously, they didn't even want to let me in to collect my things). Stas Malyavin has emigrated to Israel at the very beginning of the open phase of the war, for me that's another proof he's a good person who never supported what their government does.
What happened to Liuba Shmakova, the woman who actually spotted the creature in the sterile sealed Petri dish with the 24 thousand years old soil, I don't know. But the photo with her writings on the 24-well plate experiment (of my design, I'm rather proud of it) is still there in NY Times pages.
We all had given tons of interviews within 3 months after the paper was out. But the NY Times journalist contacted me by email 8 hours BEFORE the paper was officially published in Current Biology, and their questions were the most clever ones. In the next interviews I was by the way asked 'what about Crimea, since you're a Ukrainian working with Russians' (technically, Liuba's the only Russian in the team because Stas is probably a Jew, and other people were from the US and Germany). Shame on me, I always considered Crimea Ukrainian/Crimean Tatar, but back then I was still thinking that science is an international thing and the discovery we're making is more important than political agenda. I don't think that anymore.
But I'm glad it was out before things got totally caboom.
And I'm not over with my own research on those animals.
The NY Times report on our paper is still there on the web. Starting from the next week, I'm re-taking my job at the university, at the same table I missed so much, haha (seriously, they didn't even want to let me in to collect my things). Stas Malyavin has emigrated to Israel at the very beginning of the open phase of the war, for me that's another proof he's a good person who never supported what their government does.
What happened to Liuba Shmakova, the woman who actually spotted the creature in the sterile sealed Petri dish with the 24 thousand years old soil, I don't know. But the photo with her writings on the 24-well plate experiment (of my design, I'm rather proud of it) is still there in NY Times pages.
We all had given tons of interviews within 3 months after the paper was out. But the NY Times journalist contacted me by email 8 hours BEFORE the paper was officially published in Current Biology, and their questions were the most clever ones. In the next interviews I was by the way asked 'what about Crimea, since you're a Ukrainian working with Russians' (technically, Liuba's the only Russian in the team because Stas is probably a Jew, and other people were from the US and Germany). Shame on me, I always considered Crimea Ukrainian/Crimean Tatar, but back then I was still thinking that science is an international thing and the discovery we're making is more important than political agenda. I don't think that anymore.
But I'm glad it was out before things got totally caboom.
And I'm not over with my own research on those animals.
Border collies
Dec. 25th, 2024 03:06 pmhttps://www.facebook.com/reel/382279837893475
Amazing. There is scientific proof that border collies among all dogs enjoy the process of learning as itself?
They don't need special treats for performing tasks, only verbal praise for the job correctly done.
I could not find the paper that the guy's citing, instead I found one in which it is proven these dogs can comprehend that human words mean certain object names.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0376635710002925
In the same time, they get bored very quickly. It's like having a smart toddler with ADHD, apparently :)
Amazing. There is scientific proof that border collies among all dogs enjoy the process of learning as itself?
They don't need special treats for performing tasks, only verbal praise for the job correctly done.
I could not find the paper that the guy's citing, instead I found one in which it is proven these dogs can comprehend that human words mean certain object names.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0376635710002925
In the same time, they get bored very quickly. It's like having a smart toddler with ADHD, apparently :)
