Researchers in training who want to explain their research can enter the 3rd Comas i Solà Contest

Image of the winning film in the 2nd Comas i Solà Contest, <i>Brain mapping</i>, by Joanna Sierpowska.
Image of the winning film in the 2nd Comas i Solà Contest, Brain mapping, by Joanna Sierpowska.
Research
(19/01/2017)

The period to submit proposals for the 3rd Comas i Solà Contest opens next January 20. This film contest aims to bring people closer to the research carried out at the University of Barcelona in a visual and agile way as well as giving visibility to PhD students as the motor of the University. The PhD students can submit their proposals until May 22 and the winners will be announced in the site of the project during the first week of June 2017.

This contest is jointly organized by the Doctoral School of the UB and the Scientific Culture and Innovation Unit (UCC+i), with the support of the Institute of Education Sciences (ICE) of the University of Barcelona. The bachelor degree in Audiovisual Communication of the UB collaborates with the Contest offering consultancy to PhD students who ask for guidelines, advice or opinion in order to work on their audiovisual pieces. Those interested have to send an email to the head of studies of  the degree, Jorge Franganillo: franganillo@ub.edu.

 

Image of the winning film in the 2nd Comas i Solà Contest, <i>Brain mapping</i>, by Joanna Sierpowska.
Image of the winning film in the 2nd Comas i Solà Contest, Brain mapping, by Joanna Sierpowska.
Research
19/01/2017

The period to submit proposals for the 3rd Comas i Solà Contest opens next January 20. This film contest aims to bring people closer to the research carried out at the University of Barcelona in a visual and agile way as well as giving visibility to PhD students as the motor of the University. The PhD students can submit their proposals until May 22 and the winners will be announced in the site of the project during the first week of June 2017.

This contest is jointly organized by the Doctoral School of the UB and the Scientific Culture and Innovation Unit (UCC+i), with the support of the Institute of Education Sciences (ICE) of the University of Barcelona. The bachelor degree in Audiovisual Communication of the UB collaborates with the Contest offering consultancy to PhD students who ask for guidelines, advice or opinion in order to work on their audiovisual pieces. Those interested have to send an email to the head of studies of  the degree, Jorge Franganillo: franganillo@ub.edu.

 

Contest specifications

The audiovisual works have to be understandable for a non-specialized audience -not used to scientific language, because one of the contestʼs objectives is that the researchers submit excellent disseminating films. These films cannot be longer than three minutes (with credits included) and genre is free of choice: documentary, animation, experimental or any other proper category for this contest. The films can be in Catalan, Spanish and English; they can be in other languages provided that there are subtitles in any of the three mentioned languages. Films related to any field of knowledge will be accepted and therefore themes can be diverse. These works have to be publicly published on Youtube, and in order to submit them, participants must fill an online form.


Awards

The University of Barcelona will link the participating videos to its Youtube channel, and the jury, who will award three prizes, will assess in particular the scientific rigor, disseminating effort and clarity of the message as well as the quality of the audiovisual works. The three winners will receive an iPad Air 2 (16G Wi-fi model) or equivalent; a free enrolment for any of the intensive language courses organized by the School of Modern Languages (EIM) within the 2017 summer offering, as well as a merchandising set of products of the University of Barcelona.

Presented films collect more than 18.2000 views

The awarded films of the first edition of this contest were Metabolisme tumoral, Textured in peace (TIP) and Alien species vs. genomics by Helga Simon, José Antonio Padilla and Maria Casso, respectively. In the second edition of the contest, the PhD students Joanna Sierpowska, Elisabet Tintó and Silvana de Souza Pinheiro were the winners for the videos Brain mapping, Ap2-hs, un gen important en el paràsit de la malària? and Un microscopio virtual, respectively.

All submitted films in the previous editions of this contest, awarded and non-awarded ones, are available at the Youtube channel of the University of Barcelona and gather, with the first and second edition, more than 18.000 views.

Josep Comas i Solà 

This contest is named after the Catalan astronomer Josep Comas i Solà was an important scientific disseminator, apart from being a notable astronomer. He had been interested in astronomy since he was very young. Aged fifteen, he studied a meteorite that fell near Tarragona, and published the results of his analysis in the journal Astronomie. He excelled in his studies on asteroids: he discovered eleven asteroids and developed a new method to calculate their orbit. Apart from his scientific research on astronomy, he experimented with photography and cinema applied to astronomical observation and developed studies on seismology. He contributed to found the Spanish Astronomical Society and was its first president. He had been director of the Fabra Observatory since its creation. Comas i Solà published studies in the main scientific journals of that time and wrote more than 1.200 scientific disseminating articles for the press. He collaborated in radio programs and also wrote some of the most distributed books on astronomical dissemination in Spain. He offered conferences and guided visits to the Fabra Observatory and the observatory he built in his house, Vil·la Urània, in the district of Sarrià-Sant Gervasi (Barcelona).