USTH organised the first event of Café Scientifique series

On 25/06/2020, University of Science and Technology of Hanoi (USTH, Vietnam France University) organised the first event in the Café Scientifique series with an aim to provide an open space for everyone interested in science and technology to discuss latest ideas in the field.The Café Scientifique series at USTH, inspired by the idea of Duncan Dallas’ Café Scientifique meetings in Leeds, United Kingdom during the year of 1998, is organised by the Direction of Research, Innovation and Technology Transfer (DRITT) – USTH.

At the opening ceremony, Dr. Luc Le Calvez, Director of DRITT remarked that Café Scientifique is an open space for science story-tellers, as well as a place to find friendship, happiness from good science, and help that is “free of charge.” Café Scientifique will be organized every last Thursday of each month and is open to lecturers and students at USTH.

usth organised the first event of cafe scientifique series 3 — *Dr. Luc Le Calvez talks about the aims of the event*

Dr. Nguyen Thanh Hien (Lecturer of Department of Water – Environment – Oceanography), member of the organising team, introduced the significance and meanings of the Café Scientifique series, which is: “You can’t focus without coffee. Likewise, you can’t do science without collaboration.” Café Scientifique is expected to become the place where lecturers and students of USTH share ideas of research topics to build collaborative relationships in doing research.

usth organised the first event of cafe scientifique series 2 — *Dr. Nguyen Thanh Hien gives opening speech at the event*

The first two story-tellers of Café Scientifique No.1 were Dr. Mai Huong on Microplastic pollution: Baseline assessment in Vietnam, and Dr. Pham Van Nhat on Microfluidics: A versatile tool for interdisciplinary researchers.According to Dr. Mai Huong, plastic production has increased sharply since the 1950s because of its convenient, material’s durability and inexpensive costs. Annually, the plastic production is above 300 million tons in the world, which has posed a significant concern about plastic pollution for water and soil,leading to environmental problems such as destroying the biodiversity of ecosystems, threats to aquatic life as they accidentally ingest micro or macro plastic wastes, causing groundwater pollution, and changing soil structure which lead to result in soil erosion and landslide in mountain areas. Therefore, many countries, e.g. Vietnam with 28 to 73 million metric tons of plastic wastes annually (approximately 6% of total world plastic production), need to promote research on plastic waste management and microplastic pollution of different environments such as soil, air and/or aquatic ecosystems.

usth organised the first event of cafe scientifique series — *Dr. Mai Huong on Microplastic*

Sharing at the event, Dr. Pham Van Nhat stated that microfluidics is a novel approach for many types of research due to fast chemical reaction rate, tiny volume of sample, easy operation requirements. Some applications of microfluidics are: Organ-on-chip, Droplet as microreactor,…

usth organised the first event of cafe scientifique series 1 — *Dr. Pham Van Nhat on Microfluidics*

Both research topics have received constructive comments and questions for further discussions from lecturers and students attending the event. The next meeting of Café Scientifique is expected on 30/07/2020.