UPWr veterinary student in the TopMinds program

Maksymilian Lewicki's mentor is Magdalena Antosiak-Iwańska Phd Eng. from the Maciej Nałęcz Institute of Biocybernetics and Biomedical Engineering, Polish Academy of Sciences, specialist in projects and innovation at the Laboratory of Nanohybrid Biosystems Regulatory Engineering.

– I have always been involved with veterinary medicine. My mother is a vet, so the choice of studies was obvious to me. But I was looking for a mentor in the program with different criteria in mind. I want to prepare for a doctoral school and for the requirements of a job in science. Veterinary medicine, like human medicine, is becoming more and more specialized. My mentor is associated with an institution where medicine has a different – technological – dimension, because we all see the development of technology in this field of science. When I entered the program, I wanted to combine these two perspectives – says Maksymilian Lewicki.

TopMinds is a mentoring program of the Top 500 Innovators Association, which includes scientists, entrepreneurs and specialists in the field of technology transfer and commercialization, as well as members of the Polish-American Fulbright Commission, which enables scientific and cultural exchange between Poland and the United States. This year's edition includes 24 participants. The inauguration took place online, on the last weekend of January. The mentees took part in meetings with prof. Janusz Bujnicki, head of the laboratory at the International Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Warsaw, who in his research combines bioinformatics and structural biology, and prof. Katarzyna Marciniak, director of the Centre for Research on Antique Tradition at the University of Warsaw, classical philologist, Italianist, graduate of MISH (Interdisciplinary Individual Studies in the Humanities) at the University of Warsaw. During the inaugural meeting of mentors and mentees, both sides talked about their experiences regarding successes, failures and problems connected with the work of a scientist. They also discussed work ethics, publishing and how to solve difficult situations.

Maksymilian Lewicki admits that it is not easy to qualify for the program. In the application you have to show not only your scientific achievements or plans, but also yourself as a person. The student presented to the veterinary commission evaluating the applications his activities in the Student  Veterinary Surgery Science Club Lancet, in which he is a board member and the Chiron Club, active at the UPWr Faculty of Medicine, as well as his activities in the student government.

– I also wrote about my internship with prof. Agnieszka Noszczyk-Nowak at the Department of Internal Medicine and Clinic of Diseases of Horses, Dogs and Cats, but also about my involvement in my mother's clinic, where I deal with the entire spectrum of medicine, because there are different patients: guinea pigs, hamsters, dogs, cats, all of them with different ailments – admits Maksymilian Lewicki and adds that he was looking for a mentor in the field related to medicine, but form outside the university.

– I see professor Noszczyk-Nowak regularly, I have learned a lot from her and I see my future in cardiology, but it seems to me that it is good to have a mentor from a different field of science. This broadens your horizons and gives you a chance to learn something new – says Lewicki.

This time, a mentee of prof. Noszczyk-Nowak is Beata Latos, a PhD student at the Atmospheric Physics Department, the Institute of Geophysics of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw.

– Among the mentors of this year's edition there is no one from my specialty – atmospheric physics, so I started looking according to a different criterion. Professor Noszczyk-Nowak impressed me with her achievements, publications, but also energy. I also wanted a woman to be my mentor – I work in a team in which there are almost exclusively men, and the professor is not only a great scientist, but also has a family, which means that she combines spheres that for many are impossible to combine – says Beata Latos and smiling, she adds: – Besides, I like animals. And I thought that someone who treats them, looks for new therapies and helps in general, must be a good person.

TopMinds is a mentoring program intended to open the door to an international career for young Polish scientists. During several months of mentoring meetings, numerous workshops, training sessions and panels, participants plan their academic career path and learn how to achieve their own ambitious goals. So far, three editions of the program have taken place, in which over 120 young people and their mentors took part.

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