Palaeontology

Life in distant past

Fossils provide reliable data on events that occurred on the Earth tens and hundreds of millions of years ago.

Some one hundred million years ago, the present day Serbia was much less warm than it is now and this territory, instead of the present day land, was a large archipelago with numerous islands. Of all the living beings which have ever inhabited the Earth, only five percent have been preserved in form of fossils. A fossil is a part of a plant or an animal, a trace of movement by animals, a foot print, or a print of a leaf in the rock.

Palaeontology discovers how life on our planet unfolded and changed over a couple of billion of years! Based on such findings, we can understand today what the climate used to be, where water bodies were located, and we have access to numerous data relevant for present day life and for forecasts of the future development of living beings. These are the topics that outstanding Serbian palaeontologists are presenting in this feature article.

Museums

Story of Trains

The Railways Museum in Belgrade (Nemanjina 6) was founded in 1950 and is the only museum of its kind in Serbia. Apart from the chief exhibition in the headquarters of Serbian Railways, there are also collections in a number of locations: the Department of Narrow Gauge Railways in Požega, the Museum-Historical Complex “Šarganska osmica”, the locomotives exhibited in a number of key towns across Serbia, the „Romantika“ train, etc.

The exhibition also includes: railway lanterns, old telephones, clocks, breaking devices, uniforms, railway markings, switches, signal devices, etc. The Museum also has its archives and a library with more than 9,000 books and magazines. Among the most interesting documents is the railway itinerary for the royal train dating 25 June 1914 for the train by which the Austria-Hungary Archduke Franz Ferdinand travelled to Sarajevo.

Physics

Carioles Effect

When an object is moving from the pole of the Earth, where the circular rotation of the Earth equals zero, towards the Equator, it continually encounters regions with greater circular speed. At the Equator this speed is the greatest at 1,664 km/h! It is not felt but it is a reality. During this moving from the state of lower to higher circular speed, the object is „carried away“. Technically speaking, it is under the influence of inertia. The consequences of this phenomenon are greater than it is usually believed.

This phenomenon was first described in 1835 by the French mathematician Gustave Gaspard Carioles. The rule is easy to remember: no matter in which manner something moves, it will be deflected in its movement more or less to the right in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the Southern hemisphere! One of the most obvious consequences of the Carioles effect is the ever changing banks of rivers flowing towards the north or the South. Apart from changes in relief, this effect also creates property and even inter-state disputes.

The Carioles effect is felt in the space as well.

GERB

Healing through Change of Diet

Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERB), a digestive tract disease caused by reflux of stomach content into the oesophagus, often demonstrates dominantly respiratory symptoms. Therefore otorhinolaryngologists are often the first to detect the existence of the disease, says dr Tatjana Ikić, specialist otorhinolaryngologist of the General Hospital Bel Medic in Belgrade.

The disease manifests different symptoms, some of which resemble asthma. The great number of different symptoms can often be misleading. If the symptoms are manifested in the throat and the nose, local therapy is administered with ORL drops. If there are problems with vocal cords, a sample of larynx mucous is tested. The disease is treated with medications; and if this proves insufficient, surgical treatment follows.

Intervention Radiology

Surgery in the Past – Stent Now

Thanks to intervention radiology, many health issues which in the past demanded exclusively surgical treatment by conventional open surgeries – can now be treated with low invasive procedures. Intervention radiology has a pioneering role in the development of therapy procedures such as cardiac catheterisation, installing stents and the use of other techniques sparing patients of physical trauma and ensuring speedy recovery. These are the topics discussed by dr Slobodan Vranješ, radiology specialist at the Belgrade General Hospital Bel Medic.

Dr Vranješ speaks of new medical engineering, radiology diagnostics, development of new surgical techniques, vascular and non-vascular radiology, use of radiology in children, etc.

Bariatric Surgery

Weight Loss Accompanied by Disappearance of Diseases

Extreme obesity is a serious threat to human health and is presently a risk factor of cardiovascular and cardiac diseases, diabetes 2, and other diseases. In fighting, bariatric surgery proved to be very effective in regulating excess weight and body mass caused by accumulated fat.

After the surgery, the stomach volume is reduced and thus the intake of food as a risk of the onset of new disorders. Prof. dr Đorđe Bajec, specialist in general surgery and associate of the General Hospital Bel Medic, presently it is being considered across the world to introduce this procedure as a means of regulating diabetes 2. He goes on to describe the different indications for different procedures, and how to proceed in patients with associated diseases, as well as describing the surgical procedure and techniques and cooperation with patients.

Psychology

Re-Righting Things – Reology

A new term in the field of psychology – reology – refers to „re-righting the mistakes of the past“. American psychotherapist Jake Eagle, author of „ReRight Your Life – An Introduction to Reology“, talking to us on-line, is talking of ways in which we can re-right what we did in the past and what has had deep traces.

Eagle explains the need to look persistently into one's own „deflected thinking“ and the new use of language, he speaks of why people strive to be happy, describes the new psychotherapy workshops, whether we can re-right the mistakes of our lives, can we transform a conflicting relation which was oppressing us for a long time into a closeness, what is the alternative to bad life streams, what is a healthy relation to oneself and to others, how in a new way to interpret and accept reality, how to respond to repeated disappointing experiences, etc.

Aeronautics

From „Aeroput“ to „Air Serbia“

The first civilian flight in the then Kingdom of Yugoslavia happened on 15 February 1928, from Belgrade to Zagreb, by aircraft „Potez 29-12“. Before that time, on 29 May 1927, the Air Travel Society “Aeroput“ was founded. Aviation soon grew to cover cities in neighbouring countries, and as of 1938 „Aeroput“ had a fleet of 12 passenger and 3 air-taxi aircrafts.

After World War Two, Yugoslav Airways JAT was established. Since then, the company grew and modernised its fleet continually and the number of passengers was increasing. The period from 1985-1990 is perceived to be “the golden days of JAT“. At that time JAT operated flights on more than 80 destinations in five continents, and JAT ranked 31 st globally in terms of number of passengers!

Further development was interrupted by the disintegration of the then Yugoslavia.

In August this year a contract has been signed on strategic partnership with Etihad from United Arab Emirates and a new company was founded called „Air Serbia“. After 86 years of operation, the once wonder of technical and business performance has gone into history forever.

Flying over Mars

Research from Above

A more comprehensive research of the Mars and the topographic mapping of its surface implies the need to fill the gaps in the images received from orbitters and those sent by lenders and rovers. As things stand now, this could soon be achieved by use of aircrafts which would fly over the surface of the planet and take images from the distance of 1-2 kilometres.

The aircraft could take images of the surface below and of those in the horizontal plane, and it could scan by radars such terrain needed for rovers, take images of ice covered spaces at the polar cups of Mars, to search for and possibly detect methane (if any), which would be indication of possible sub-terrain biological activity present there.

The article speaks of the French project of probe-balloon, the German balloon and what NASA has done in this respect so far. With respect to aircrafts, mention is made of the NASA project Micromission, the ARES aircraft, etc.

Mycology

Truffle –underground mushrooms

Science has been interpreting truffles for more than three centuries. It is known today that they live in symbiosis with various other plants, mostly deciduous. They grow all year around. In Serbia and Montenegro 13 different species of this mushroom have been identified.

AT the end of the 19 th century, the Serbian King Milan Obrenović imported dogs trained to search for truffles. Since then, about two hundred locations have been detected growing this rare mushroom, of which one is located in a part n Belgrade.