Published 3 February 2014 Some people say it’s about time, and Deputy Vice-Chancellor Eva Wiberg agrees that the time is now ripe. After an intensive week in South Africa and Botswana, with visits to seven universities, alumni events and official openings, it is time for Lund University to put its Africa strategy down on paper. The delegation in Pretoria. Back row l-r: Isabel de Necker (from Preto

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/university-visits-first-step-towards-africa-strategy - 2025-02-05

Published 3 February 2014 The children are poor, the problems are extensive and school resources are minimal. However, in the midst of the poverty, there is pride and a strong sense that it is possible to change the situation for these schoolchildren. LUM has met alumni in South Africa and Malawi from the Sida programme ‘Child Rights, Classroom and School Management’. Headmistress Amelia Nthokgoan

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/lund-alumni-reform-schools - 2025-02-05

Published 3 February 2014 In the heart of the beautiful wine-producing region of Stellenbosch is the STIAS research institute. It welcomes researchers from around the world to spend a number of months working with a focus on Africa. LUM visited cognitive science researcher Peter Gärdenfors and his project team at Mostertsdrift farm. “It’s a privilege to be here. You have peace and quiet to concent

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/peaceful-research-institute-boosts-creativity - 2025-02-05

Published 3 February 2014 Lund University is strong in terms of publications. Stellenbosch University has very good equipment. Doctoral student Ahmed Fawzy is part of a research group in Chemical Physics that is collaborating with South Africa to find efficient catalysts in chemical processes. Ahmed Fawzy is a doctoral student in Lund, but uses equipment at Stellenbosch University for his research

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/mutual-collaboration-gives-strength-research - 2025-02-05

Published 5 February 2014 Previous EU framework programmes have focused largely on engineering, medicine and science, but over the next seven years, the EU wants to see more interdisciplinary research and collaboration, as well as more social science and humanities. But will Horizon 2020 be the breakthrough that the humanities have hoped for? “We are heading in the right direction, but we’re not t

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/humanities-late-joining-horizon-2020-train - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Lund University offers over 100 Master’s programmes and a growing number of Bachelor’s programmes in English. In order to recruit more international, fee-paying students who have the prerequisites to complete their studies, the Education Board has decided to investigate the possibility of offering preparatory English language training. Similar programmes can be found in

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/university-considers-international-foundation-year - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Lund University has allocated almost SEK 500 000 of strategic education funding for a new course created in a collaboration between the faculties of Law and Medicine and Loyola Law School in the US. The course will be on how to ensure legal protection of innovations at the intersection of law and medical technology, and of European and American law. It will be offered as

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/law-and-medicine-create-innovation-course - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 This autumn, Lund University will offer its first three free open online courses, known as MOOCs. They will be in green economy, global health and European business law. Despite this decision, opinions are still partially divided. Some see MOOCs as a motor for development that will rejuvenate and adapt higher education to new methods of learning. Others fear that the hyp

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/green-light-three-moocs - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Royal climate change researcher Harriet Bulkeley doesn’t believe that directives from above cause us to change our behaviour. On the other hand, she believes in the creative and fumbling environmental experiments that she has seen popping up in cities around the world. Now she is going to study climate-friendly initiatives in Sweden. Harriet Bulkeley at the royal lunch f

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/green-cities-grow-roots - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Geologist Charlotte Sparrenbom could be called a water detective. In her research, she searches for facts about underground water and its age in order to investigate and minimise the risk of pollution in groundwater. She is very concerned about insufficient monitoring of water quality by Swedish authorities. Senior lecturer Charlotte Sparrenbom is participating in the ne

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/water-detective - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Meet Ingvar Wirfelt – the new managing director of Gerdahallen, the university sports centre, from 1 March. What do you think is lacking at Gerdahallen at the moment? “I think there are a good range of activities and that the centre is good at picking up new trends. ‘Indoor walking’ is something I’d like to see – but it requires a lot of space. ‘Crossfit’ is another new

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/what-lacking-gerdahallen - 2025-02-05

Published 28 February 2014 Enzymes developed in Lund could be used in university and industry labs worldwide in the future. This is what Professor Eva Nordberg Karlsson hopes; her research group has signed a contract with an Icelandic biotech company that is going to sell their products. Eva Nordberg Karlsson wants to give other researchers reliable access to enzymes. Photo: Ingela Björck The cont

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/enzymes-lund-set-take-over-world - 2025-02-05

Published 3 March 2014 Patients with diabetes or Parkinson’s disease can be cured with stem cells at a clinic in China. Multiple sclerosis, stroke and cerebral palsy are treated at a stem cell clinic in Mexico, and in Thailand, the deadly disease ALS can be cured with stem cells... at least according to advertising from these and other clinics around the world. Desperate individuals travel there i

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/hyped-hope-shady-stem-cell-clinics-take-advantage-desperate-patients - 2025-02-05

Published 3 March 2014 The situation of patients with Huntington’s disease is in many respects different from patients with other serious conditions. “The condition affects the brain, the very foundation of who we are, and is caused by a diseased gene. If you have the gene, you will develop the disease sooner or later, regardless of how healthy a lifestyle you have”, says ethnologist Niclas Hagen

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/difficult-living-risk-huntingtons - 2025-02-05

Published 28 March 2014 Petra Östergren is a social anthropologist who has received SEK 3 million to participate in a major new EU project about how to tackle human trafficking by studying demand. Around 15 researchers from eight countries are taking part in the project, the goal of which is to reduce the suffering that results from the worst forms of exploitation. Petra Östergren. “No. We often t

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/human-trafficking-primarily-about-prostitution - 2025-02-05

Published 28 March 2014 This autumn she was awarded SEK 22 million in ERC grants for her Alzheimer’s research. In addition, she is a member of the Nobel Prize committee for chemistry, she has written children’s books, won the veterans’ European Championship in orienteering and is director of Humlegården, a day centre for people with autism. Meet Professor of Chemistry Sara Snogerup Linse. Sara Sno

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/multi-tasking-top - 2025-02-05

Published 28 March 2014 What if you could take a substance that allows a nasty bacterium to resist the human immune system and develop it into a drug to help people with completely different diseases? It sounds like a fairy tale for medical researchers. Yet this is precisely what is about to happen in Lund. Lars Björck hopes that the enzyme IdeS can be used to treat a number of autoimmune diseases

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/enzyme-killer-bacteria-could-save-seriously-ill-kidney-patients - 2025-02-05

Published 28 March 2014 In our everyday lives, we surround ourselves with electronics without really thinking about it. We go to work by car or train, travel by air when we go on holiday, and are reliant on our mobile phones, iPads and laptops. We take the products’ functions for granted, until they suddenly stop working. The fact is that this happens fairly often – every year in Sweden, we pay ro

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/eu-project-produce-more-reliable-electronics - 2025-02-05

Published 28 March 2014 At the Academy of Music in Malmö, Peter Spissky from Czechoslovakia found an opportunity to develop his interest in baroque music – a genre that didn’t suit the political system in his homeland. Through his research on how gestures taken from speech, acting and dance can be compressed into the movement of the bow, he hopes to come closer to the lively, vibrant playing that

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/bowing-swing - 2025-02-05

Published 31 March 2014 For a researcher to be successful, he or she not only needs to produce good research – it also has to gain exposure. However, there is competition for space in scientific and popular science journals. This has led to the growth of a grey area with unprofessional journals that take payment from researchers who want their work to appear. Kristoffer Holmqvist recommends the in

https://www.staff.lu.se/article/unprofessional-open-access-publishing-new-industry - 2025-02-05