Research & Expertise news at HSE University

Researchers of the HSE University and the Southern Federal University (SFedU) have tested a new method for studying the perception of facial emotional expressions. They suggest that asking subjects to recognise emotional expressions from dynamic video clips rather than static photographs can improve the accuracy of findings, eg in psychiatric and neurological studies. The paper is published in Applied Sciences.

One million people in Russia suffer from venous diseases. The ‘Intelligent data analysis for healthcare information systems’ Mirror Lab project brings together expertise in mathematics and medicine in order to better diagnose various conditions in phlebology. Project leader Vasilii Gromov talked to The HSE LooK about its achievements and prospects.

An international team of astrophysicists has been studying the formation of strong electrostatic waves, ion holes, in the Earth's magnetotail and assessing their impact on space weather. They found that ion holes propagate oblique to the local magnetic field. The study's findings can contribute to a better understanding of processes in the Earth's magnetotail which affect space weather in the near-Earth plasma environment and the polar region. The paper is published in Geophysical Research Letters.

Ilya Dolmatov, Director of the HSE Institute of Economics and Utility Regulation, heads a Mirror Lab project titled ‘Models of Energy Infrastructure Development in Russia’s Remote and Isolated Territories’ and implemented together with a university in Irkutsk. Why is energy efficiency a particularly pressing problem in remote territories? How can economics and engineering work together to solve it? Ilya Dolmatov addressed these and other issues in his interview for The HSE LooK.

Education is in the process of being partly reformatted into an on-demand service, with digital platforms quickly and efficiently matching teachers to students. This can make education more personalised and accessible and open up new professional development and money-making opportunities for teachers. But is an Uber-like model really good for education? The following discussion of uberisation in education is based on a paper by philosopher Timur Khusyainov, Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Humanities at the HSE Campus in Nizhny Novgorod.

The start of a new academic year is an excellent time to plan the next steps in your academic career. On September 1, HSE University announced the start of its annual Student Research Paper Competition (SRPC-2022). Participation is open to students of Russian and international universities and to 2022 graduates. Last year, a total of 2,196 papers were submitted to the SRPC, of which 435 were from external participants.

On September 1–3, the HSE International Laboratory of Algebraic Topology and Its Applications will host the international conference 'Computer Methods of Cognitome Analysis'. Konstantin Sorokin, Research Assistant at the Laboratory and organiser of the conference, spoke about the main topics of the event and his hope that it will inspire pure mathematicians, physicists and computer scientists to apply their knowledge and intuition to the problems of brain-function mechanisms.

Researchers from HSE University studied the perception of social robots (robots that are able to communicate with people and assist them with various needs) in everyday situations. They studied the perception of such factors as the robots’ appearance, speech, interaction situations, as well as the respondents’ characteristics. The scholars found that androids are more desirable in various situations than humanoids (robots that only vaguely resemble humans).