Montenegro has a great chance to be the home of a regional institute where the most modern cancer therapy would be applied, Minister of Science Sanja Damjanović told "Vijesti".
"It is extremely important that we do not miss this chance for our region, i.e. to make a step forward on the political side and make a more stable agreement of all the countries of the region. Also, we should put our egos aside, because wherever the institute is located, the entire region will have huge benefits", said Damjanović.
She also spoke to "Vijesti" about Prime Minister Duško Marković's support for a larger budget for science, strengthening the connection between science and the economy, and cooperation with the scientific diaspora.
The Ministry of Science will dispose of a 5,1 million euro budget. It is almost doubled compared to the 2016 budget. How much does the government's financial support mean to you? What does it enable?
I am very grateful to the Prime Minister and my colleagues from the Government for showing their trust in me by increasing the budget for science. It was very difficult for me to fight for him, because in our country the results of scientific work are still not as visible as the contribution to every citizen. The direct link between science and economy, which we must re-establish and strengthen, has also been lost. Also, the social engagement of science through education, critical awareness and solving common challenges should be intensified.
Thanks to the increase in the budget, and being aware of our potential, we defined ambitious goals (short-term, medium-term, and long-term) and began to achieve them. When it comes to short-term goals, we launched as many as four large competitions, two of which are new in our system. Each of the competitions makes a targeted attempt to eliminate existing weaknesses. Aware of the fact that Montenegro has a small number of researchers, we opened for the first time a competition for doctoral research in the country, with which we want to build a new generation of researchers, but also through the attractiveness of scholarships and retain our best talents. We began to solve the problem of low investment of the economic sector in science and innovation by opening a competition for innovative grants, where the condition was the participation of the economic sector as the main project holder or as a partner. I am sure that the contracted funds of 1,5 million euros went into the right hands.
The intersection of these two competitions is the employment of about 40 young and highly qualified people, but also a significant additional investment by the economic sector, which shows that there is a will of business to invest in science and innovation. The third competition for scientific-research grants, for which we allocated funds of one million euros, aims to encourage quality in scientific research work. When it comes to this competition, the evaluation is ongoing and we expect the results at the end of January. The competition is very competitive because we are able to finance 10 out of a total of 70 submitted projects. And the fourth competition for new centers of excellence, which has been opened, will be of great importance for the establishment of an effective national ecosystem of science and innovation. Through all competitions, employment, international collaborations and cooperation with the diaspora are encouraged.
laboratoryI am sure that the implementation of these projects will lead to a significant shift in science and innovation in our country, and after some time to a critical mass that can start a new cycle of our economy as well as the wider social sphere, based on knowledge and innovation. All this, I believe, will make the science budget for 2020 increase further, because we know that countries that invest smartly in science and innovation are also economically developed. Our country has that potential.
Do you think that it will contribute to preventing the departure of young talented researchers from the country? How else can we prevent them from leaving?
Among the young people who leave the country, there are often those who are looking for better conditions for practicing first-class science - the "scientific diaspora" is a special segment of emigration from all less developed countries, and even developed ones such as Italy. The battle for talent is continuous and not at all naive. Montenegro has an outflow of talents, although due to social relations, and probably also due to the comfort and beauty of our country, there is a tendency for our people to return or at least want to build strong professional ties here. I see this every day, when our prominent scientists from the diaspora address and visit me, that's how I felt myself. We should use the connections with our people abroad and turn the "outflow of talent" into a "circulation of talent", where people would come for short professional stays, transfer knowledge, bring contacts, enrich ideas. This year, as part of the Program for Encouraging the Innovative Ecosystem, we will open a competition for "scholarships for visiting lecturers" and "organization of summer and winter schools of science and innovation", which will encourage the exchanges I talked about.
What I strongly feel, and why I pledged my enormous energy, is the joining of Montenegro to international scientific infrastructures, but also the need to establish a new, large-scale research infrastructure in our region, which would bring with it the attraction of exceptional personnel. When I presented the SEEIIST project at a conference with the scientific diaspora last year, I received enormous support and understanding from our people in the diaspora, who said that they themselves would have returned or would not have left if such a thing had existed at the time when they were deciding on their career.
Sanja DamjanovicNineteen young researchers received from the Ministry scholarships worth a total of about 750.000 million euros for scientific research work. What projects will Montenegrin researchers work on? Are there any projects that are particularly close to you?
Among the 19 winners of scholarships for doctoral research, we have all fields of science. The topics of their works are very interesting and innovative, and I think that everyone who was at our celebration where we briefly presented each project could feel that. There are topics from comparative literature, through monitoring changes in our language, analysis of the cultural identity of the city, to the study of indigenous cheeses, protection of biodiversity, new materials in construction, study of the effects of international hotel chains on the tourist economy, further progress in our exceptional analysis group signals and others. To me, of course, the closest thematic project is in the field of physics, which strengthens the cooperation of Montenegro with the CMS experiment at CERN, but this had no influence on the decision on the awarding of the scholarship because our evaluations are external.
You are particularly dedicated to the establishment of the International Scientific Institute for Southeastern Europe, where the most modern cancer therapy would be applied. How close is Montenegro to becoming the home of such an institute?
We are aware that due to the recent historical circumstances in the area of Southeast Europe, the intensity of scientific research activities has slowed down considerably, and as a consequence, we have been suffering from a large outflow of talents, especially young creative people. On the other hand, the same region recorded intensive technological developments in the past and achieved significant scientific results at the European level. In order to restore the tradition of technological development, reduce the current gap between our region and the rest of Europe, but also bring back the people who left here, the most effective way is to establish an international, large and competitive research infrastructure in Southeast Europe. And I am really glad that the Government of Montenegro, that is, Montenegro as the smallest country, initiated this important project for an area with about 40 million inhabitants.
In a very short time, significant progress was made in the implementation SEEIIST project.
Thanks to the support of the European Commission, Commissioner for Science and Innovation Carlos Moedas, initial funds in the amount of one million euros were approved to start the next, so-called. preparatory phase of the project. We also received support from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for the training of our personnel. Also important is the support of the management of CERN, as well as the management of the GSI Institute, so that the seats of the preparatory phase will be precisely in these prestigious institutions. What I would like to emphasize is that there is support from these institutions to launch technology for a new generation of facilities for medical research and cancer therapy using heavier ions. This means that we have a chance to implement a unique project in the world. It is extremely important that we do not miss this chance for our region, i.e. to make a step forward on the political side and make a more stable agreement of all the countries of the region. Also, we need to put ego aside, because wherever the institute is located, the entire region will have enormous benefits.
scienceThe choice of the location of the institute will be transparent, but I believe that Montenegro has a great chance, taking into account our geographical position, the proximity of borders with five countries in the region, but also the multi-ethnic and multi-religious harmony and tolerance that characterizes us.
Given that since the beginning of your mandate, European funds for science have been used in the right way, do you think that this is the right way for countries that cannot allocate much for that area from their own budget?
I am very pleased that we have begun to use the advantages of membership in the leading EU program for research and innovation, Horizon 2020, in a better way. It would be ideal if our country had already built scientific capacities to be able to withdraw significantly larger funds from this program, which are theoretically unlimited. However, there is still a very large gap between our stage of development of science and innovation in many areas and what is being done in the H2020 program. That is why we must make significant efforts to build our system, to "do our homework" as they say in the European Commission, and after that we will be able, as some countries do, to fully play the card of international collaborations. Last year, for the first time, we made a net profit in this program, which confirms that our country has potential. Although we are still waiting for the results of the evaluation of some competitions, this year we also had a positive balance from participation in this program.
Teams from our country got involved in several new projects. These are the projects of the University of Montenegro, the University of Donja Gorica, the Institute for Entrepreneurship and Economic Development, the Clinical Center, the Foundation for the Promotion of Science, and the Institute for Marine Biology. Through Horizon 2020, funds were also used to start the preparatory phase of the SEEIIST project. The total value of all projects amounts to 1,538 million euros.
Initiating the realization of a large international scientific infrastructure in our region, the SEEIITS project, opened an additional path towards H2020 funds. The preparation of the application for the prestigious Marie Curie ITN call with a total value of 4,6 million euros is underway, which we are preparing together with the international scientific community that supports us.
science, scientistPersonal contacts enabled a better status of Montenegro in the scientific world
You have been with the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) for about fifteen years. How much did you personally contribute to the fact that today we have the opportunity to send not only students but also high school teachers to this most influential laboratory in the world? How much does it mean to you personally?
I have been part of the scientific diaspora for almost 20 years, and most of my career was spent at CERN. Working in this prestigious international scientific institution in which people from 120 nations are engaged, but also in the GSI Institute in Darmstadt, Germany, is my greatest personal asset. And it is precisely my direct and indirect contacts that mean a lot in paving the way for Montenegro to better position itself on the European infrastructural scientific map.
These contacts were important for Montenegro to become a full member of one of the largest projects at CERN - the CMS experiment, as well as the largest European institutions in the field of 'biological systems' EMBL and EMBO. The procedure for access to international infrastructures is not at all easy, and the benefits are huge because with a small contribution, Montenegro has access to multi-million dollar infrastructures and new technologies.
The approach to such large-scale projects has a triple importance: political, economic and scientific. I will highlight an economic aspect that is not well known. Namely, these institutions represent a very attractive market for marketing certain products or services that can also come from less developed countries. Also, the contacts I made enabled the open support of many international and national European institutions to the SEEIIST project. I will remind you that a group of international experts did the Concept Study of the SEEIIST project, a document of about 100 pages, on a volunteer basis. The study was presented to the public for the first time at the Forum that we organized in Trieste in January 2018, where we received the support of the European Commission for the realization of the following, so-called Preparatory phases of the SEEIIST project – Hadronic cancer therapy and research in the field of biomedicine using protons and heavier ions.
I would like to take this opportunity to point out that the first 500 patients were treated with this modern method precisely at the GSI Institute in Darmstadt, and that at that time its general director was my mentor during my PhD in Heidelberg, prof. Hans Specht. He still provides me with daily advice and support.
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