Linear programming via problem solving

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Terézia Kisková - Stanislav Matéffy - Františka Horváthová

The laboratory rat (Rattus norvegicus) is one of the most commonly used experimental animals. It serves as a model organism for analyzing numerous biological processes and pathological mechanisms, such as cardiovascular diseases, metabolic disorders (e.g., lipid metabolism, diabetes mellitus), neurological and neuropsychiatric conditions (e.g., stroke, epilepsy, or Alzheimer's disease), neurobehavioral research, autoimmune diseases (e.g., arthritis), cancer, and renal diseases. It offers many unique advantages for modeling human diseases, testing drugs and natural substances, and studying responses to environmental factors. The size of the laboratory rat, compared to the mouse, creates ideal conditions for physiological manipulations. Additionally, rats are used in clinical toxicology to test chemical substances (Hedrich, 2000).

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Nataša Tomášková

Selected tasks and problems from biochemistry – metabolism follow biochemistry lectures on metabolism and individual metabolic pathways for students of the second and third year of the bachelor’s degree in the fields of chemistry, biology and their combinations with other fields. Scripts provide an opportunity to better understand the lectured subject matter of metabolism through the solution of tasks and problems as serve as a basis for one-hour exercises. The scripts are divided thematically into eleven chapters, and each chapter contains 10 tasks and 7 problems. At the beginning of the chapters there is a short description and explanation of the given metabolic pathway. However, when solving the tasks, the student must focus mainly on the curriculum that was presented on the given topic in the lecture. Subsequently, at the end of chapter, answers to problems are also presented. These scripts are intentionally accessible only in electronic form. The reason is the effort to continuously update and modernize individual tasks.

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E-book

Peter Kollár

The textbook Semiconductor Elements was developed gradually over the past years as an aid for second-year master's students in condensed matter physics. It is intended to support students’ understanding of lectures, considering that important texts, mathematical relationships, and illustrations are provided in advance in the form they will be presented during the lecture.

This allows students to supplement individual pages with their own notes during the lecture, either electronically or in printed form. In this way, a study aid is created for the student, which I believe will help with the final review of knowledge gained throughout the semester in preparation for the exam. This textbook is not meant to serve as standalone literature but is designed to assist orientation in the literature, which is abundant in English but mostly written for scientists, researchers, and students for whom this topic is central and not just one of many parts of their education. Therefore, it is not allocated a larger scope in the study program.

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Vladislav Kolarčik

Flow cytometry is a diagnostic and research technique that enables rapid analysis of cells, nuclei and organelles of plants and other organisms. In plant biology, it is most often used for DNA content analysis in a wide range of applications. It is the method of first choice and its importance is even increasing compared to competing technologies. It is unrivaled in speed, accuracy, repeatability and low cost. Flow cytometry has become a standard tool in laboratories focused on biological-ecological plant research.

This textbook provides information on the historical development of flow cytometry and its establishment in the analysis of the plant genome. It describes the procedure of sample analysis to determine the nuclear DNA content and presents the basic applications, such as determination of genome size, ploidy level and reproduction modes of plants and determination of endopolyploidy level in plant tissues. These college textbooks are intended for students, teachers and anyone interested in the use of flow cytometry in scientific work with plant cells.

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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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Renáta Oriňaková

We have prepared a publication that focuses on the personalities of professors. These personalities represent entire scientific teams, participated in the creation of new study programs, and had a significant impact on the formation of the faculty. Factually, we tried to capture the basic data in a uniform structure. We are building on a similar publication from ten years ago, which greatly helped us, especially with professors who worked at the faculty many years ago and whose memories are gradually fading. The ambition of the publication is to contribute to the preservation of basic information that is closely related to the history of the faculty.

doc. RNDr. Roman Soták, PhD. Dean of the Faculty of Science, UPJŠ in Košice

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E-publication

Beáta Valkayed.
Ivana Slepáková-Lenka Maliničová a kol.

The EFFUSE Teacher's Guide is a practical educational material for primary and secondary school teachers who want to develop environmental awareness with their pupils through field-based learning. It is based on the concept of the EFFUSE project (‘Environment for the future by science education’), which aims to link science, research and education with environmental protection. The manual provides teachers with methodological support for planning and implementing outdoor activities aimed at observing and documenting organisms around the Laborec River and the Uh River. It contains instructions for working with real samples, basic biomonitoring procedures and offers the opportunity to participate in the creation of a virtual laboratory that mirrors the state of the local aquatic ecosystem. Through these activities, pupils will learn to understand the links between human activity and the state of the environment, while learning the basics of how scientists work in the fields of biology and ecology. The guide also motivates teachers to become agents of positive change, inspire the younger generation to be active and engage the community in conservation. It is a challenge and an opportunity to create a space for meaningful learning in line with current trends in environmental and digital education.

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 Mária Kožurková - Martin Putala 

Cieľom tejto knihy je spracovať názvoslovné zásady a pravidlá, podľa ktorých sa tvoria slovenské názvy biochemických zlúčenín. Táto monografia je po dlhšom čase prvým pokusom o spracovanie tohto problému, a preto dúfame, že bude pomôckou a prínosom nielen pre študentov a učiteľov ale aj vedeckých pracovníkov. Poslúži aj študentom stredných škôl, ktorí majú záujem o biochémiu a molekulovú biológiu. Kniha obsahuje najnovšie názvoslovie, zásady a pravidlá pri tvorbe názvov biochemických zlúčenín. Kniha plne aplikuje odporúčania spoločnej komisie Medzinárodnej únie pre teoretickú a aplikovanú chémiu (IUPAC) a Medzinárodnej únie pre biochémiu a molekulárnu biológiu (IUBMB) so zahrnutím aktuálnych úprav názvoslovia, stereochémie a grafického znázornenia štruktúr podľa IUPAC. 

Autori

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

Juraj Černák

A significant part of inorganic chemistry is coordination chemistry, which deals with coordination compounds. Coordination compounds are numerous because they arise from the combination of central atoms, mostly metals, with ligands, and every organic compound is a potential ligand. This is confirmed by a recent report that American scientists M. Brookhart, C. Schauer, and their colleagues from universities in North Carolina and Washington described the preparation of a rhodium complex with methane as a ligand.

This textbook is based on the long-term experience of the author in teaching and testing this subject. The subject is well-covered in several textbooks of varying difficulty in English; their partial list can be found by readers in the list of used literature at the end of this textbook. On the other hand, in Slovak language, coordination chemistry issues are only marginally covered in several textbooks focused more on general inorganic chemistry but lack a comprehensive view on this topic. From this follows the goal of this proposed textbook - to cover the lack of study literature in this area for Slovak language.

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Marcel Uhrin - Petr Benda -  Peter Kaňuch

Bats represent a unique group of mammals, characterised by different life strategies. They are the only mammals capable of active flight, which, combined with their almost exclusively nocturnal activity, has led to the evolution of specific adaptations. One of the most striking is echolocation, which enables them to orientate themselves perfectly in their surroundings in the dark. Bats are mainly native to the tropics, but have also colonised areas outside the tropics, which, has led to a complex phenological cycle with active phases and interruptions during hibernation, especially in temperate zones. In this diverse and species-rich group (almost 1,500 known species), there is a wide range of social organisation as well as feeding and roosting strategies. The textbook "Fundamentals of Chiropterology" brings the current state of knowledge about these extraordinary animals in eleven chapters and two appendices for the first time in the Slovak language.

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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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Pavol Sokol - Ladislav Bačo - Tomáš Bajtoš

In the university textbook, we present the theoretical foundations and technical details of the activities of a forensic investigator. We describe the identification and provision of digital tracks, file system analysis. analysis of various artifacts of the Windows operating system, analysis of the operating memory. The textbook is also supplemented by a chapter devoted to the analysis of malicious code (malware). University textbooks are intended for students of bachelor's, master's, engineering and doctoral study programs in computer science, but also in non-informatics fields.

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E-book

Erik Bruoth - Juraj Šebej - Ľubomír Antoni

In these university-level textbooks, we present the fundamental concepts of networks and graph theory. We explore breadth-first and depth-first graph searching. We present static and dynamic network models. We describe the issue of detecting overlapping and non-overlapping communities in directed and undirected networks. Various approaches to anomaly detection in networks also form an important part of this textbook. The final chapter is dedicated to spectral clustering, which plays a significant role in data mining in network graphs for various application domains.

These textbooks are suitable for first and second-year university students in computer science programs. The study materials are also suitable for students in non-computer science fields, with the aim of improving their knowledge and practical experience in computer science-related areas, and provide an opportunity for students to find employment in IT companies to solve practical tasks.

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Ladislav Janovec

An enormous progress in computer technology, closely linked with advances in computational chemistry, has enabled the user to exploit the principles of quantum chemistry to elucidate the chemical phenomena.

Computational chemistry is the branch of science that requires, except an academic knowledge, software skills to fully exploit a potential of theoretical methods. The aim of this textbook is to help the user take the legendary first step in the field of computational chemistry to opening a new horizon of knowledge.

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Andrea Morovská Turoňová - Renáta Oriňaková - František Kaľavský 

The university textbooks "Practical Exercises in Physical Chemistry" are intended as teaching literature for students of the 2nd year of the Chemistry study program and the 3rd year of the interdisciplinary study program at the Faculty of Science of the Pavel Jozef Šafárik University in Košice.

The three chapters summarize the basic knowledge of thermodynamics, electrochemistry and kinetics, the next chapter deals with the measurement of some other physico-chemical quantities. The tasks developed on the basis of cooperation with the Criminalistics and Expertise Institute of the Police in Košice, which also participates in the innovation of practical teaching, are also very attractive and interesting for students. Thematic units are updated and supplemented by new knowledge, principles as well as detailed working procedures using new instrumentation.

The aim of laboratory exercises in physical chemistry is to illustrate and confirm the physicochemical laws and correlations that apply to the quantitative description of chemical phenomena. Students will learn to use instruments and equipment that occur in physico-chemical laboratories, they will learn the principles of accurate and correct quantitative measurement of physical quantities, important from a chemical point of view. They can also develop professional and scientific communication skills, and we want to support their creative approach to making measurement protocols.

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