Katalóg

E-book

Slávka Hamuľaková

The textbook "Structure and reactivity - solved examples and tasks, part 1" is the basis for teaching the subject "Structure and reactivity" for students of the 1st year of master's studies at the Faculty of Science, UPJŠ, department of Organic Chemistry. The textbook is divided into individual chapters, each chapter offering students examples of chemical reactions, where their course is explained on the basis of appropriate reaction mechanisms. A substantial part of the textbook consists of unresolved tasks, the main goal of which is the development of students' knowledge and skills. Due to the fact that the textbook is focused on only one semester of study, it cannot cover all reactions, rather it is only representative examples of different types of reactions, such as: addition reactions, elimination reactions, aromatic substitution, addition-elimination reactions, radical reactions and pericyclic reactions.

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Jozef Strečka- Katarína Karl’ová (eds.)

Zborník obsahuje program a abstrakty workshopu s názvom: 1st Workshop on Perspective Electron Spin Systems for Future Quantum Technologies, ktorý sa bude konať 28.-29. júna 2022 v Košiciach. Workshop je organizovaný Prírodovedeckou fakultou Pavla Jozefa Šafárika v Košiciach a Ústavom experimentálnej fyziky Slovenskej akadémie vied v Košiciach s finančnou podporou Agentúry na podporu výskumu a vývoja. Ústrednými témami konferencie budú súčasné problémy kvantovej fyziky - kvantovej teórie magnetizmu spinových a elektrónových štruktúr, exotických kvantových spinových stavov, kvantového previazania, kvantových fázových prechodov, topologického kvantového počítania a kvantového spracovania informácie. Účastníci workshopu budú prezentovať originálne pôvodné výsledky svojho výskumu, ktoré môžu zásadným spôsobom ovplyvniť vývoj budúcich kvantových technológií.   

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E-book

Ivana Šišoláková - Radka Gorejová - Jana Shepa - Renáta Oriňaková

The university textbook "Advanced Electrochemical Methods" is a teaching aid intended for master's or doctoral students studying electrochemical subjects at the Department of Physical Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice.

These textbooks follow and further develop textbooks focused on the basic electrochemical methods currently used in modern research. The presented teaching texts are processed in sixteen clear chapters, where they provide a theoretical principle and derivation of electrochemical processes and mechanisms in individual methods. Teaching texts also consist of practical laboratory exercises, in which students can try out the real application of the studied electrochemical methods.

The practical tasks are focused primarily on the demonstration of research that is carried out at our workplace. Students will be able to try, for example, electrochemical modification of the electrode surface, preparation of electrochemical sensors for the determination of analytes, preparation and characterization of a dye-sensitized solar cell or electrochemical evolution of hydrogen.

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E-book

Katarína Kimáková

The textbook is intended for university students who are preparing for the profession of biology teacher. The structure of the book is similar to an encyclopedia, with one page devoted to each content item, but the topics of the chapters and subchapters follow each other.

The explanatory text on the page illustrates the diagram and there are notes and links to other sources of information. For better orientation, the content of the textbook is divided into 8 sections, which cover several chapters. It follows the general didactics, which it connects with the teaching of biological content. The book provides a basic orientation in the approaches to learning this subject, and also explains the relationship between biology as a science and the didactics of biology. It deals with teaching standards and curricula, advises on how to master biological concepts and understanding, how to communicate with students in biology classes, when and why are effective visual and practical methods. It acquaints the reader with the issue of setting goals for biological education in the cognitive, psychomotor and affective areas in relation to formative and summative assessment.

Hopeful as well as experienced teachers will find in this publication not only a look into the history of teaching biology, but also a look into the future. Current trends in biology teaching, the connection of teaching with digital technologies, the virtual learning environment and interactive simulations and models belong to science lessons today.

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E-book

Jozef Bednarčík (ed.)

The SFEL school is continuation of the Winter Schools of Synchrotron radiation held in 2011, 2013, 2014 and SFEL 2017, 2018 and 2019. All schools of the series were held here, in Liptovský Ján, where our conference venue offers conditions for friendly and creative atmosphere.

The aim of the SFEL 2022 school is to facilitate the growth of a new Slovak research community with high expertise in the area of high-efficiency RTG laser, synchrotron and neutron sources. The SFEL school is designed for efficient transfer of the rapidly developing know-howin these areas to young generation – researchers and university students. The next aim of the SFEL2022 is strengthening of personal connections between the local Slovak research community and actually forming scientific teams of XFEL users, scientific teams of synchrotron or neutron sources users, respectively.

Slovak research community thus can take advantage of the fact that Slovakia is a shareholder of the European XFEL GmbH company in Hamburg, but also makes more efficient use of other closely related scientific facilities, including ILL and ESRF in Grenoble and DESY in Hamburg.

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E-book

Jozef Bednarčík

Crystallography deals with discerning the arrangement and bonding of atoms in crystalline solids. Almost immediately after their discovery, X-rays began to be used to study the internal structure of substances.

The first chapter of this textbook deals with the basic concepts of crystallography. At the beginning, crystalline solids are characterized. In the next section, the basic types of bonds and their characteristics are briefly presented. The main subject of this chapter is the interpretation of basic concepts such as symmetry operations, translational periodicity, grid, elementary cell. Spatial lattices and crystal systems are presented. At the end of this chapter, attention is paid to the description of individual types of defects in crystal structures. In the second chapter, the Bohr model of the hydrogen atom is presented. Individual quantum numbers and their meaning are given.

Next, energy levels and allowed transitions within an atom with multiple electrons are described. The second chapter concludes with the characterization of the basic absorption and emission processes. The third chapter is devoted to the production of X-ray radiation and its properties. Sources of X-ray radiation and a description of their operation are presented.

Interaction of X-ray radiation with matter, absorption and detection of X-ray radiation are the subject of the last part of this chapter.

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E-book

Milan Žukovič

This textbook is intended for master's degree students and is a follow-up to the Computational Physics I course studied at the bachelor's level. The content of the textbook Computational Physics II focuses on stochastic methods of solving physical problems, mainly on Monte Carlo (MC) simulation of many-particle systems.

The focus on this computationally intensive approach is motivated by the gradual increase in the computing capacities of ordinary computers as well as the introduction of high-performance computing clusters. This has led to significant progress in the development of new simulation techniques, thanks to which MC simulations have found application in various areas of research and application practice. Considering the main research focus of the department, this text is particularly devoted to the presentation of basic and more advanced MC simulation techniques applied to a simple Ising spin model in order to investigate its magnetic, thermodynamic and critical properties.

The next part is devoted to MC simulations of random processes. It focuses on the simplest but also the most basic random walk process and demonstrates its applications in financial analysis and the solution of a quantum system described by the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. The last part is dedicated to the basics of molecular dynamics, applied to simulating the classical movement of atoms in a given force field. By mastering the problems addressed in this course, students will obtain a potential tool for working out of their diploma theses, or a methodology useful for their further scientific and research practice in the field of investigating of complex systems.

The lectured topic is subsequently exercised in the form of preparing projects implemented in the freely distributable software Octave, which is easy on the user's programming skills and which students have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with in the previous study.

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E-book

Jana Shepa (ed.)

The book of abstracts from 6th International Conference on Nanomaterials: Fundamentals and Applications, NFA 2022 is composed of contributions from the participants of this international conference. The conference consisted of 4 invited lecture and 52 abstracts of participants. The conference is focused on nanotechnology and its application in various research areas. All contributions are professionally processed and inspiring.

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E-book

Jozef Strečka

Over the past fifteen years, the course on ’Exactly Solvable Models in Statistical Physics’ has become an indispensable ground of the study programme ’Theoretical Physics’ at Faculty of Science of Pavol Jozef Šafarik University in Košice. At first, the course based on the first edition of this textbook was intended for undergraduate students only, however, I have later prepared follow-up course taught at a postgraduate level on demand of several ambitious students who wished to continue in studying this exciting research field.

It is already more than decade when our students enrolled in the study programme ’Theoretical Physics’ graduate from ’Introduction to Exactly Solvable Models in Statistical Physics’ at a master level and ’Exactly Solvable Models in Statistical Physics’ at a postgraduate level. Of course, it was necessary somehow to rearrange topics for the courses of undergraduate and postgraduate students.

More specifically, a few more challenging topics concerned with exact solutions of 2D Ising model (chapter 3) were moved to a more advanced course intended for the postgraduate students, while an introductory course intended for the undergraduate students was contrarily supplemented with a few new topics requiring the second edition of this textbook.

The second edition of this textbook thus contains a completely new chapter 4 devoted to the exact solution of the Ising model on the Bethe lattice using the method of exact recursion relations, while the chapter 5 was supplemented by exact results for ground state of a few frustrated Heisenberg spin models using the variational method. It is my hope that the next edition of this textbook will come soon and it will involve all topics specifically taught within the postgraduate course as well. 

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E-book

Mária Vilková - Monika Garberová - Michal Goga

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) is currently a widely used analytical tool that finds application in many fields of science and technology. The broadening of its practical use brings with it the necessity to create educational texts appropriate to the given scientific discipline.

This university textbook is intended for students of biology and serves as a supplement to the study materials for the advanced master's course "Biology of Lichens." At the same time, it represents a useful resource for master's and doctoral students involved in research, helping them interpret NMR spectra and present basic theoretical concepts.

The textbook briefly describes the important aspects of each NMR spectroscopic technique without delving excessively into the physical principles of individual methods or complex mathematical analyses. In this edition, the structures of lichen metabolites have been included, which students will isolate, purify, and identify using various analytical methods during practical exercises. An entire chapter is dedicated to a detailed description of solving the NMR spectra of isolated metabolites, with each step in elucidating the structures of both known and unknown metabolites explained in detail. The solved tasks are followed by numerous unsolved examples, including high-resolution 1D and 2D NMR spectra of metabolites, intended to further develop the acquired knowledge and skills of students and doctoral candidates in structure elucidation using NMR spectroscopy.

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E-book

Stela Csachová - Ján Kaňuk - Alena Gessert - Ladislav Novotný - Štefan Gábor - Jozef Šupinský

This book addressed the inquiry-based learning and teaching with the support of geospatial technologies. Today, geospatial technologies are influencing geography teaching learning, particularly in secondary education. Theoretical framework gives the reader the insight to inquiry-based learning, with special focus on inquiry in geography. The one-by-one step of inquiry is analysed in detail. The major part of the book presents the eleven models of geography lessons, representing the subject content of physical, human and regional geographies, various levels of inquiry and use of different geospatial technologies. The readers are acquainted with the use of geographic information system (particularly Google Earth and ArcGIS online), web portals, webGIS, open data, mobile applications and new forms of 3D cartographic visualisation (virtual reality, 3D print, dynamic 3D map) in teaching geography. The lesson models were tested with the students to be geography teachers in school year 2021/2022. This books serves as resource mainly for undergraduate teacher students and in-service geography teachers.

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E-book

Monika Tvrdoňová - Miroslava Martinková

The scientific book of abstracts from conference „Novel Trends in Chemistry, Research and Education 2022“ is a summary of the contributions of conference participants, which contain the original results of their scientific and research activities. The contributions published in this volume can be divided according to content into the field of analytical, inorganic, organic, physical chemistry, biochemistry, didactics of chemistry and NMR spectroscopy.

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E-book

Pavol Mártonfi

The university textbook deals with the latest knowledge from the systematics of vascular plants in a clear manner. Vascular plants arose in the Silurian period in the Paleozoic, when the first primitive plants moved from water to dry land, which required evolutionary progress in the morphological and anatomical structure of these plants. During about 420 million years of the existence of vascular plants, several of their main groups have evolved: the spore vascular plants, including the lycopods (branch Lycopodiophyta) and group of ferns and related plants (branch Monilophyta), and the seed plants, including gymnosperms (branch Gymnospermae) and angiosperms ( Angiospermae), which currently dominate among plants. The textbook provides a brief but comprehensive overview of the main groups, orders and families of plants with their description, distribution, main representatives, while also addressing the useful properties of selected species. The work is complemented by an overview of the system of plants by Cronquist, Tachtadžjan, APG and an overview of the families of the Slovak flora, as well as a taxonomic index.

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E-book

Karel Saksl

Solving crystal structures is the royal discipline of X-ray crystallography. Its primary task, with the exception of defects, is to describe the atomic structure of the motif that, by its repetition, fills the volume of the entire crystal or crystalline phase. This task is nowadays more or less routine for single-crystal X-ray diffraction, which can locate hundreds to thousands of non-hydrogen atoms in large unit cells. However, in real practice, we often have material available only in powder form instead of single crystals. Solving the atomic structure from its X-ray diffraction data is non-trivial, mainly because the three-dimensional diffraction space of a single crystal is reduced to one dimension by measuring a large number of randomly oriented microcrystals (crystallites). Therefore, the solution itself requires, in addition to proper measurement methodology, the selection of suitable tools, procedures, and strategies that, through optimization, will lead to the solution and refinement of the given crystalline phase. The current limit of this method is approximately 100 non-hydrogen atoms in the asymmetric part of the unit cell, which, however, is sufficient for most inorganic materials.

The goal of these educational texts is to provide students in the second and third levels of university studies with specific guidance on solving crystal structures from powder X-ray diffraction data. These scripts build upon my first monograph and require practical knowledge of its content. Similar to my previous monograph, I offer solved examples without a deep theoretical introduction, demonstrating procedures and strategies leading to the correct solution of crystalline phases using the freely available GSAS-II program. The examples are arranged from simpler to more complex, and the reader will find many useful pieces of information in the literature references as well as in the comments below the line. Part of these scripts are data intended for your individual practice of the described procedures. 

Karel Sakls

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E-book

Vladimír Komanický

The aim of this textbook is to acquaint students in physics, chemistry and material science on both undergraduate and graduate level, with the techniques used to prepare micro-electromechanical devices, nanoobjects and nanostructures using the so called top down methodologies. The is no requirement for this course to pass any prior courses. The introduction part of the text defines the forces that affect nanoobjects and the interactions between them. Reader can understand in detail why properties of nanomaterials and nanostructures are so different when comprared to their macroscopic counterparts. Text gives also an overview of thin film preparation technologies as precursors for the preparation of nanostructures. The main emphasis in Volume I is on conventional lithographic technologies for the preparation and shaping of nanostructures, methods for characterization of thin films, nanoparticles and nanomaterials. Unconventional lithographic methods will also be discussed in the prepared upcoming Volume II. Student will also get acquainted with the applications of nanostructures in research focused on nanophysics, nanocatalysis and nanoelectronics. The textbook is used as a study material for the course ÚFV / MPN / 14 - Methods of preparation and characterization of nanostructures. Part of the course is also a laboratory exercise in which the student gets acquainted with the techiques used for the preparation and characterization of thin films and top-down technologies used for the preparation of nanostructures.

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E-book

Danica Sabolová

This university textbook is intended for students of the Faculty of Science of the University of Applied Sciences in Košice who have enrolled in practical exercises in Biotechnology, but also for all other students who are interested in learning about the practical applications of biotechnology.

The aim of the practical course is to familiarize students with basic biotechnological methods and their applications. The students will verify in practice the theoretical knowledge acquired in the Biotechnology lectures such as the course of fermentation processes, wine production, preparation of fermented milk products and cheese, preparation of culture media, inoculation and cultivation of microorganisms, etc. The practical exercises also include the use of analytical and spectral methods, which are an integral part of biochemistry.

The scripts are published only in electronic form and are available on the University's website: http://kosice.upjs.sk/~kbch/sk, for the reason that it will always be possible to update and modernize the content of the laboratory exercises.

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E-book

Daniela Kladeková

This university text is intended for students of chemical and ecological sciences at the Faculty of Natural Sciences of the P. J. Šafárik University in Košice and is intended to serve as a tool for experimental exercises in colloid chemistry. Colloid chemistry is an important part of the theoretical basis of the chemical sciences and belongs to the newer interdisciplinary fields of natural sciences.

It combines knowledge from physical chemistry, physics and biology, while also drawing on a solid knowledge of mathematics and other scientific disciplines. Experiments are often essential in understanding the problems of colloid chemistry, modelling ideas about the phenomena and laws involved in the discipline. This is why active participation in experimental exercises is so important and essential to mastering the material in colloid chemistry.

In selecting the tasks for these scripts, it was also necessary to respect the considerable limitations imposed by the possibilities of the laboratory instrumentation and material equipment of our department. Despite this limitation, however, they can illustrate to students the basic theoretical physicochemical principles of colloid dispersion systems and, importantly, their understanding can contribute to the understanding of some of the more important peculiarities of colloidal phenomena.

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E-book

Janka Vrláková - Stanislav Vokál

Atomic and nuclear physics are relatively young scientific disciplines forming the final part of the general physics course at the Faculty of Physics of the Jagiellonian University. Their aim is to explain the nature of the basic physical properties of atoms, atomic nucleus and elementary particles.

This is also the content of the lectures and exercises ‘General Physics IV’ in the 2nd year of the Bachelor's degree in Physics at the Faculty of Natural Sciences (PF) of the P.J. Šafárik University (UPJŠ) in Košice. They are followed by optional lectures ‘Nuclear Radiation in the Environment’, ‘Introduction to the Physics of the Microworld’ in the 3rd year of the Bachelor's degree of single-discipline study of physics, or teacher study of physics in combination with another subject, and ‘Subnuclear Physics’ in the 1st year of the Master's degree of teacher study of physics in combination with another subject.

In the aforementioned lectures, the latest experimental findings on the structure and behaviour of the microworld are presented by means of physical theories and their subsequent experimental verification in experiments.

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Božena Mihalíková - Ján Ohriska

This text is intended for first-year students in 76-12-8 ‘General Education Teaching’ in combinations with mathematics. It is based on the authors' lectures and their more than ten years of experience in teaching this subject at the Faculty of Education of the University of Applied Sciences. When writing it, the authors tried to take into account the specificity of mathematics teaching studies.

The present teaching text was not written due to the lack of textbooks on mathematical analysis. The reason for writing it was the authors' findings that the students do not have sufficient experience in working with specialized literature from secondary school, the difficulties for many of them (especially in the first semesters) are caused by even a slightly different interpretation, not rarely also by a change in labeling, which makes them miss the essence of the studied problem. The authors of the text did not set out to be original. Their aim was to make such a selection of topics as is necessary for a future teacher of mathematics and to choose such a method of interpretation which, in their opinion, is suitable for first-year students.

A good mastery of the curriculum (expansion of the mathematical apparatus and the related possibilities of applying other methods of proof as well as the acquisition of the necessary numerical skills) presupposes the use of other literary sources (textbooks, collections of problems) according to the teacher's recommendation.

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E-book

Peter Paľove-Balang

The text ‘Uptake and transport of mineral substances in plants’ in Slovak language provides a general overview of the uptake and distribution of substances in an easy-to-understand form.

The individual chapters introduce students to the properties of the soil environment, which have a significant influence on the availability of substances, as well as the transport of substances across membranes and over medium and long distances. The text contains the latest findings from the English literature, supplemented by diagrams and graphs created by the author on the basis of his own research or by compiling several sources.

The text is intended primarily for students of a master's degree in biology or ecology and assumes at least a basic knowledge of plant physiology.

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E-book

Jozef Kováčik

These "Exercise Manuals" present a concise overview of commonly used methodologies as well as progressive techniques, such as the use of liquid chromatography and fluorescence microscopy. Individual tasks were selected based on the research focus of the Department of Botany at the Faculty of Science, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, particularly in the context of "stress physiology."

Some tasks can also be utilized within the subject "Plant Ecology." Chamomile (Matricaria chamomilla) is typically used as a model plant for individual tasks due to its long-standing history of research at the Department of Botany and its ease of cultivation under laboratory conditions. The chapters also briefly discuss the significance of monitored parameters, principles of their determination, and metabolism (formation or degradation), aiming to indicate their mutual context.

This approach highlights that determining an individual parameter cannot provide a general explanation for the overall causes and impacts of observed changes; however, it can serve as a basis for testing hypotheses at the level of other parameters.

For deeper study of specific issues, there is an abundance of high-quality international monographs and review articles available.

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E-book

Ondrej Hutník

The concept of the integral is one of the most significant concepts in mathematics as a whole. In its most primitive form, it was already used by the ancient Greeks in the creation of Euclidean geometry. However, it was only after Descartes' work on analytical geometry in 1637 that mathematicians could begin to consider the integral as a subject of analysis. Descartes' work laid the groundwork for the discovery of infinitesimal calculus by Leibniz and Newton around 1665. At that time, a great dispute arose over the priority of this discovery, dividing scholars of Germany and England into two opposing camps, each favoring their own champion. Today, we know that Newton's work on fluxions and fluents was somewhat earlier, but Leibniz's notation and approach have gained more acceptance in the mathematical world, and the symbols ∫ ∫ and d d are still used today. A brief overview of the history of the integral will be presented in Chapter 1.

Today, there is a plethora of scripts, textbooks, and books dedicated to explaining the concept of the integral. Therefore, every potential author faces the initial question of whether to write another text on this topic. Our affirmative answer to this question was driven by the students' request to find the subject matter of a part of the winter semester of the second year presented in a coherent form. The second motivation is a slightly different approach to the topic. If we consider the methods typically used in solving problems and gaining routine with a certain integral, it mainly involves the Newton-Leibniz formula, and often there is little time left to compute the definite (Riemann) integral using its definition. Therefore, we included a discussion of the Newton integral in Chapter 2, which reflects this fact and is directly related to the indefinite integral, whose various calculation methods receive relatively much attention in the previous semester. Only after that, in Chapter 3, do we build the theory of the Riemann integral, present criteria for its existence, classes of integrable functions, basic properties, and finally its relationship with the Newton integral. Questions primarily concerning geometric applications are addressed in Chapter 4, and in the final chapter, we focus on extending the Riemann integral to unbounded functions and unbounded intervals.

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E-book

Rastislav Varga

The movement of domain walls in ferromagnetic materials is utilized in various magnetic devices for storing, processing, or transmitting signals and information. This mainly includes transformer cores, various sensors, memory devices (e.g., HDDs in PCs), as well as modern spintronic devices such as Racetrack memories, domain wall motion-based electronics, and so on.

This book is intended to serve as a textbook for advanced courses in the field of magnetic materials. It is primarily aimed at students interested in studying magnetic materials, as well as professionals from various fields who wish to understand the basics of domain structure and its changes. It is divided into nine chapters. The first chapter deals with a brief history of the study of domain structure in magnetic materials. The second chapter provides an introduction to the causes and manifestations of magnetic anisotropies. The third and fourth chapters are devoted to the causes of domain structure formation and domain walls. The fifth chapter discusses the structure of domain walls, their potential, and the critical field required for domain wall movement. The sixth chapter is dedicated to magnetization processes, one of which - domain wall movement - is discussed in detail in chapter 7. The eighth chapter contains a theoretical solution for domain wall movement. The final ninth chapter presents a modern method of domain wall movement induced by electric current.

The presented work assumes that the reader has at least basic knowledge in the field of magnetism. Otherwise, the author refers the reader to basic literature (e.g., [2.1 - 2.6]).

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E-book

Ľubomír Šnajder - Ján Guniš

The publication lists interim results of qualitative educational research focused on the development and evaluation of programming tasks being carried out by authors since 2005 in the frame of programming competition PALMA junior.

The publication consists of three chapters: Computer science competitions in Slovakia, Tasks in computer science education, Selected problems of PALMA junior competition. The first chapter provides an overview of computer science competitions for a primary and secondary schools in Slovakia. The second chapter described the issue of learning tasks - their components, focus, formulation types, and development system of tasks. The third chapter contains the assignments and commented author solutions of selected problems represented focus of PALMA junior competition – programming, algorithms and mathematics.

For each problem is mentioned analysis of pupils’ solutions aimed to ways of thinking, typical misconceptions, sets of preparatory and extended problems. The publication is addressed to computer science teacher trainers, authors of programming competitions problems, and computer science teachers.  

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E-book

Gabriel Semanišin - Emil Hutňan - Jana Oleničová

The proceedings contain contributions from participants of the UNIFOS 2014 conference, University Information Systems in Košice, which took place from October 27 to 29, 2014.

ICT centers are important element that provide functioning and development hardware and software infrastructure at Slovak Universities. There are more differences between them in real position, management, personal sources and financing. ICT centers provide a wide range of services to large number of university users and they implement the policy of information security recently.

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E-book

Gabriel Semanišin - Emil Hutňan - Jana Oleničová

The proceedings contain abstracts of contributions from participants of the UNIFOS 2014 conference, University Information Systems in Košice, which took place from October 27 to 29, 2014.

ICT centers are important element that provide functioning and development hardware and software infrastructure at Slovak Universities. There are more differences between them in real position, management, personal sources and financing. ICT centers provide a wide range of services to large number of university users and they implement the policy of information security recently.

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E-book

Rudolf Gális

The presented work provides basic knowledge of astronomy and astrophysics in a completely new multimedia format. The scope of the knowledge presented is mainly focused on stellar astrophysics and supplemented by cosmology beyond the title of the work.

A new approach in this work is the large proportion of visual materials, graphs, and video clips, contrasted with the brevity of the accompanying text. Such a form of presenting knowledge in this field is unprecedented in Slovakia, and therefore this work can be considered a completely innovative piece. It should be emphasized that the engaging form of the presented knowledge does not come at the expense of its content. The work contains all the necessary information that a physics student, especially one with a pedagogical focus, should master. The work can also be an invaluable aid to teachers in secondary and even primary schools, as well as professional astronomers in popularizing astronomical knowledge.

This suggests that the work covers a relatively wide range of needs at various institutions dealing with astronomy, from universities, through faculties of education and grammar schools, to observatories, planetariums, and astronomy clubs.

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E-book

Vladimír Zeleňák (ed.)

Proceedings of Abstracts of the Student Scientific Conference of the Faculty of Science, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice

A characteristic feature of education at high-quality universities — among which the Faculty of Science at Pavol Jozef Šafárik University (UPJŠ) in Košice proudly belongs — is the close connection between education and scientific research. Students gain knowledge in their field of study not only through theoretical coursework in individual disciplines, but also through active involvement in solving specific scientific tasks as part of research teams. This can occur during the development of final theses or through participation in the Student Research Assistant Program (ŠPVS), which was revitalized at the faculty in 2015.

The Student Scientific Conference (ŠVK) is one of the faculty’s traditional events, organized during the Faculty’s Science Days as part of Sciencefest. By its very nature, it fits seamlessly into the aforementioned framework of combining education with research, and it has long enjoyed great popularity and student interest. In 2016, the conference featured presentations by 125 students of the Faculty of Science at UPJŠ in Košice, across 16 thematic sections. This collection of abstracts provides an overview of the focus and goals of the student projects. We believe it will serve as inspiration for other potential participants of future conferences and will also be of interest to the broader public, offering additional insight into the faculty's activities.

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E-book

Milan Žukovič

The textbook Computational Physics I covers the topics taught in the course of the same name at the bachelor's level of the Physics study program, as well as in the course Application of Numerical Methods at the bachelor's level of the Applied Informatics study program.

The text builds upon the basic course in numerical methods, focusing on explaining the fundamental principles of computer-based solutions to some typical physics problems. It includes both the area of deterministic methods for solving problems modeled by ordinary and partial differential equations, as well as the area of stochastic Monte Carlo simulations. The course Computational Physics I lays the foundation for further study of more advanced computational methods taught at the master's level in the subject Computational Physics II. Nowadays, the use of computers as a tool for solving real physics problems, and for students as a tool for preparing their final bachelor's or master's theses, is almost indispensable.

This has led to the creation of numerous user-oriented software packages in various environments for solving a wide range of problems. However, without a thorough understanding of how individual computational techniques work, these programs become black boxes with many pitfalls and risks in their use. Therefore, this text emphasizes understanding both the strengths and weaknesses of individual methods and the assumptions for their successful application.

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E-book

Vladimír Zeleňák(ed.)

The proceedings contain abstracts of contributions from participants of the Student Scientific Conference of the Faculty of Science, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, which took place on April 22, 2015.

The Student Scientific Conference (SSC) enjoys long-term popularity among the faculty's students and teachers, and we are pleased that this was no different this year, with 128 contributions submitted to the SSC.

The contributions were organized into 19 sections, additionally complemented by an open programming competition and the final of the IHRA contest. For many students, presenting at the SSC is one of the first opportunities to gain experience in presenting their results before a professional audience. Considering the number of submitted contributions, along with the members of the expert juries from the faculty's teaching staff and the audience who came to support their classmates' presentations, the SSC is an event where a large part of the student and academic community of the faculty meets at one place and time. Many abstracts presented in this proceedings were developed as part of students' work on partial tasks that are components of research projects at the departments of the Faculty of Science, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University.

The abstracts represent, in a way, an overview of research topics at the individual workplaces of the faculty. The SSC proceedings thus serve as a useful tool that students and faculty teachers can use to present the faculty externally to partners, employers, and potential collaborators. Partners from practice have shown interest in cooperating in organizing the SSC for a long time. Since 2005, the association of IT companies has awarded a Prize for the Most Original Work and a Prize for the Work with the Best Prospects for Practical Application.

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Miroslav Repčák - Martin Bačkor - Peter Paľove-Balang - Silvia Gajdošová

The establishment of the Plant Physiology Laboratory at the Department of Botany, Faculty of Arts, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice in 1969 was associated with the name of Ing. Štefan Kocúrik, CSc. (1923–2006), who also prepared the first "Instructions for Exercises in Plant Physiology" (Košice 1972, 1976).

Since 1980, the manual by Associate Professor RNDr. Karol Erdelský, CSc., and Ing. Fridrich Frič, DrSc., titled "Practicum and Analytical Methods in Plant Physiology" (Bratislava 1980) has been used. With the increase in the number of students, it became relevant in 1991 to publish the "Instructions for Exercises in Plant Physiology" again to improve preparation and the efficient organization of practical work. Associate Professor RNDr. A. Košturiak, CSc., contributed significantly to the expansion of the introductory part of the instructions with his valuable advice, for which the authors are grateful. For the fourth edition, some tasks were updated and modernized, taking into account the possibilities of the renovated laboratory. The selection of tasks was adapted to the current scope of exercises for individual plant physiology subjects within the bachelor's and master's study programs in biology and ecology. These subjects include: Plant Physiology, Plant Metabolism, Mineral Nutrition of Plants, Plant Growth and Development, and Plant Ecology. Some tasks are also suitable for high school experiments.

The choice of topics was influenced by the research focus of our workplace on secondary metabolism, ecophysiology, and medicinal plants. The instructions generally adhere to the SI unit system, occasionally including other commonly used units.

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Mária Ganajová

The current teaching of chemistry has its specific problems. On one hand, due to the shift of the focus of chemistry curriculum towards theoretical content, the difficulty of chemistry material has increased, and in connection with this, students' interest in chemistry has decreased.

The lack of student interest in chemistry is mostly supported by the opinion that it is precisely chemistry that significantly contributes to the deterioration of environmental quality. On the other hand, we live in an era where we encounter chemical products practically everywhere. It is necessary to learn the basics of chemistry as well as possible, which makes the question of increasing interest in chemistry education and improving its effectiveness very relevant. State educational programs have been introduced into Slovak schools as a foundation for the creation of school educational programs. These emphasize not only acquiring a certain amount of knowledge but also the development and enhancement of key and specific competencies of students, preparing them for lifelong learning and their application in life.

Therefore, increasing attention is being paid to one of the fundamental didactic tools for raising student activity in teaching, and thus improving the effectiveness of chemistry education – learning tasks. From both theory and practice of chemistry teaching, we know that learning tasks, questions, examples, exercises, etc., are among the important components of every teaching lesson. Learning tasks are applied in all phases of teaching – in the motivational phase, the phase of acquiring knowledge, the phase of consolidating knowledge, and the phase of checking the acquired knowledge. It is therefore clear that every teacher will sooner or later find themselves in a situation where they will have to select learning tasks from textbooks, workbooks, collections of problems and examples, or create them themselves.

This scientific monograph is intended for educational specialists and chemistry teachers, aiming to familiarize them with examples of various types and forms of learning tasks and the basics of their creation in chemistry. It can also be helpful for them in preparing certification works focused on test creation and their statistical evaluation.

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