Activities

The S3I institute is involved in preparation of various project proposals that span a wide range of research topics: physics, astronomy, biology, computer science, sociology, education, etc.

  • S3I was a founder of https://transparentor.org, a project providing the total financial transparency of local governments (municipalities) in Croatia.
  • Dejan Vinkovic from S3I Institute was the Chair of BigSkyEarth COST action project from 2015 to 2019: https://bigskyearth.eu
  • In 2013 S3I was a recipient of the Google RISE award for an educational project in colaboration with Summer Science Factory and Society for Out-of-Frame Education.
  • In 2013 S3I was a co-organizer of the first Science Fair in Međimurje County.
  • In 2011 S3I conducted a research and wrote a study on the IPA4 project “Generation next at Work” on the young highly educated unemployed people in Međimurje County.
  • In 2012 S3I conduced an analysis of the innovation potential of the north-west region of Croatia. The analysis was conduced for the cross-border project SPRINT.
  • S3I was the main organizer of the international workshop titled “Toward a Platform for Motivated and Gifted Youth” financed by the “Youth in Action” Programme. The workshop was held in February 2012, with 50 participants from Croatia, Serbia, France, Hungary, Slovenia and United Kingdom.
  • S3I has been involved as a partner in several FP7 proposals. In November 2011 and 2012 it applied as a project leader to the FP7 fund under the Objective 9.2.1 “Strengthening the foundations of Space science and technology”. The collaboration partners include: Vicomtech (Spain), Stichting Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica (the Netherlands), Arivis (Germany), Astron (LOFAR telescope, the Netherlands) Università Federico II Napoli (Italy), Large Synoptic Survey Telescope Corporation (USA), University of Central Lancashire (UK), Astronomical Observatory Belgrade (Serbia), University of Ljubljana (Slovenia), University of Zagreb (Croatia) and REDEA (Croatia). The projects are about advanced computational methods in astronomy, analysis of astronomical petabyte databases and implementation of General Purpose Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). A previous application to FP7 also involved University of Geneva (Switzerland) and Leiden University (the Netherlands).
  • In 2012 a project by S3I was a regional winner (Croatia) of the European Satellite Navigation Competition.
  • S3I has an active collaboration with the Technology-innovation Centre Medjimurje on utilization of Nvidia’s Tesla generation GPUs in scientific computations. Applications include various topics such as analysis of astronomical images, fluid dynamics, astrophysical radiative transfer, atmospheric quasi-electrostatics, etc.
  • The S3I institute collaborates with the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope and the GPU group at the Physics Department at the University of Split on exploration of utilization of GPUs in the LSST software design.
  • S3I collaborates with Association Atelier des Jours à Venir from Paris on projects dealing with science communication and popularization.
  • S3I has been a co-organizer of the Summer Science Factory (SSF – a science camp for kids from age 9 to 18) in Čakovec since 2010. This project collaboration led by S3I received a grant from the World Bank 2011 Civil Society Fund Program. Only eight out of 84 applied projects received the grant that year. The contract was signed during a ceremony at the World Bank Croatia office. In 2012 S3I received a Grant from the US Embassy in Zagreb for 2013 SSF.
  • In 2011 S3I organized six events under its project “Scientists in the Schools”. The scope of these events was to organize visit of established scientists from the most prominent Croatian institutions to the schools in Međimurje County.
  • S3I has been coordinating meetings of organizers of various summer science camps in Croatia. This effort has already resulted in several project proposals with the aim of boosting the support for science and technology education in Croatia.
  • In 2011 a research on sociodemographic profile and inclination towards science and pseudo science of the participants at eight summer science camps was conducted by S3I. The results were presented in September 2011 and it has been conducted every year since then.
  • Members of the S3I institute participated in “Comenius Programme”, through study visits to “MATHEU – Identification, Motivation and Support of Mathematical Talents in European Schools” in Cyprus and “Schools in Enterprises, Enterprises in Schools: How to get them closer” in Czech Republic.