Researchers' Night 2024

This year’s Researchers’ Night in Pula was held on 27 September 2024. It covered a wide range of scientific areas and was exceptionally visited. More than 400 participants had the opportunity to get to know the University premises and participate in different workshops.

At the Faculty of Educational Sciences, full professor Iva Blažević, associate professor, Ivana Paula Gortan Carlin, assistant professor Lorena Lazarić, dr. Branka Antunović and Janko Žufić, senior lecturer were engaged in the project, and a great contribution was given by our graduate students Monika Kovač, Iva Matošević and Viktoria Ukotić, as well as by our former student Matej Macakanja.

Commercial types of shellfish in the Republic of Croatia, as well as alternative types appearing in conditions of climate change were presented in the Researchers’ night 2024. By playing the game “Finding Nemo” participants had the opportunity to meet AI robots, while the workshop “Marine kleptomaniacs” introduced them to single live organisms and they learned how naked sea snails “steal” cnidocytes and chloroplasts from other organisms and incorporate them in their tissues for nutrition and defence purposes. The problem area of invasiveness of the green alga Caulerpa and the possible measures for its removal and economic use were presented.

In the EU corner, visitors used the microscope to observe everyday things (sugar and salt crystals, grains of sand and leaves) and participated in the conduction of short and simple scientific experiments named “Double vision”, “Water layer” and “Invisible ink”. The youngest visitors enjoyed in the very successful archaeological playroom where, by playing in the sandpit, they learned how archaeological sites are formed, and what and how arcaeologists study. They found their first artifacts and ecofacts and observed them using the stereomicroscope.

The European Researchers’ Night, as part of the Blue Connect project, was successfully held at the Juraj Dobrila University of Pula for the fourth time.