Virtual Mozart, Venture Capital Bot, and Educational Video Generation: How AI is Used at HSE University
In mid-November, HSE University hosted a meetup where faculty, researchers, and administrators presented their projects and shared experiences with using AI technologies in education and research. The meeting was part of the continuing professional development programme 'Artificial Intelligence in Education and Research.'
The 'Artificial Intelligence in Education and Research' project supports the initiatives of university staff aiming to leverage advanced technologies to enhance the quality of education and scientific research. The project is carried out within the framework of the Priority 2030 Strategic Academic Leadership Programme.
Redesigning a Venture Capital Course Using AI Elements
Alexander Semenov, Associate Professor at the School of Finance, Faculty of Economics Sciences, shared his experience using artificial intelligence to redesign a course in Venture Capital. One of the primary goals of using AI was to enhance students' understanding of the financial investment market and innovative business practices.
Alexander Semenov
For this purpose, a virtual assistant was developed based on the psychologist chatbot Anna that interacts with students, helping them answer challenging questions and become more psychologically prepared to engage with investors. The use of this virtual assistant has enhanced the quality of student training and introduced new tools for discussing the psychological aspects of entrepreneurship.
AI Simulacra for a Figital Art Course
Evgeniya Evpak, Research Assistant at the HSE ISSEK Laboratory for Economics of Innovation and visiting lecturer at the HSE Art and Design School, presented a project centred on integrating AI simulacra into a course on figital art.
Evgeniya Evpak
The project’s main idea was to create virtual avatars of historical figures, such as Plato, Jean Baudrillard, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, to facilitate educational dialogues with students. These avatars were created using the Hedra and GigaChat neural networks, enabling the integration of gamification elements into the educational process and the creation of an interactive environment for studying figital art and its theoretical foundations. This approach will not only save time in creating educational video materials but also make learning more engaging for students.
AI Tools for Teaching Foreign Languages
Natalia Ryapina, Senior Lecturer at the School of Foreign Languages, HSE Campus in Perm, shared her experience using AI to teach foreign languages.
Natalia Ryapina
The main focus was on using multimodal AI tools, such as Gamma and EdrawMind, which help adapt educational materials and contribute to their comprehension by students. Generating content in various formats (video, audio, text) using artificial intelligence caters to students with different learning styles, increasing their engagement in the educational process and helping them immerse themselves more deeply in the material.
Integration of AI in Educational Activities
Ksenia Fimina, Senior Lecturer at the HSE School of Applied Mathematics, demonstrated how artificial intelligence can optimise the creation of educational materials.
Ksenia Fimina
In her work, she uses AI tools like Narakeet and Invideo AI, which reduce the time required to create presentation-quality videos by more than tenfold. AI tools offer teachers a wide range of ready-made templates and ideas for visually presenting lecture material, helping make the educational process more engaging and accessible for students. Ksenia Fimina also uses neural network technologies in developing a digital assistant for medical researchers as part of the Smart Medicine project.
Using AI to Examine the Narrative Structure of a Text
Marharyta Fabrykant, Senior Research Fellow at the Expert Institute's Laboratory for Comparative Studies in Mass Consciousness, presented the results of a study on using AI tools to analyse the emotional tone of a text and examine its narrative structure.
Marharyta Fabrykant
The project employed emotional dynamics analysis using the NLTK library to study the ancient epic of Gilgamesh. The study revealed patterns in the emotional structure of the text, confirming hypotheses about the rise and fall of emotional intensity at key moments of the narrative. Marharyta Fabrykant's project demonstrates the potential of using AI technologies for objective analysis of complex texts, which is highly significant for conducting humanities research.
The ‘Artificial Intelligence in Education and Research’ is a continuing professional development programme implemented by the HSE Faculty of Computer Sciences' Continuing Education Centre and the HSE Centre for Staff Continuing Professional Development.
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How the Brain Processes a Word: HSE Researchers Compare Reading Routes in Adults and Children
Researchers from the HSE Center for Language and Brain used magnetoencephalography to study how the brains of adults and children respond to words during reading. They showed that in children the brain takes longer to process words that are frequently used in everyday speech, while rare words and pseudowords are processed in the same way—slowly and in parts. With age, the system is reorganised: high-frequency words shift to a fast route, whereas new letter combinations are still analysed slowly. The study was published in the journal Psychophysiology.
How Neural Networks Detect and Interpret Wordplay: New Insights from HSE Researchers
An international team including researchers from the HSE Faculty of Computer Science has presented KoWit-24, an annotated dataset of 2,700 Russian-language Kommersant news headlines containing wordplay. The dataset enables an assessment of how artificial intelligence detects and interprets wordplay. Experiments with five large language models show that even advanced systems still make mistakes, and that interpreting wordplay is more challenging for them than detecting it. The results were presented at the RANLP conference; the paper is available on Arxiv.org, and the dataset and the code for reproducing the experiments are available on GitHub.
HSE Researchers Experimentally Demonstrate Positive Effects of Urban Parks on the Brain
Scientists at HSE University have investigated the effect of parks on the cognitive and emotional resources of city dwellers. The researchers compared brain electrical activity in 30 participants while they watched videos of walks through parks and along busy highways. The results showed that green urban environments with trees produce a consistent effect across individuals, helping the brain calm down and relax. By contrast, walks along busy streets were found to be distracting. The findings have been published in Scientific Reports.
Scientists Show That Peer Influence Can Be as Effective as Expert Advice
Eating habits can be shaped not only by the authority of medical experts but also through ordinary conversations among friends. Researchers at HSE University have shown that advice from peers to reduce sugar consumption is just as effective as advice from experts. The study's findings have been published in Frontiers in Nutrition.
HSE University Develops Tool for Assessing Text Complexity in Low-Resource Languages
Researchers at the HSE Centre for Language and Brain have developed a tool for assessing text complexity in low-resource languages. The first version supports several of Russia’s minority languages, including Adyghe, Bashkir, Buryat, Tatar, Ossetian, and Udmurt. This is the first tool of its kind designed specifically for these languages, taking into account their unique morphological and lexical features.
Language Mapping in the Operating Room: HSE Neurolinguists Assist Surgeons in Complex Brain Surgery
Researchers from the HSE Center for Language and Brain took part in brain surgery on a patient who had been seriously wounded in the SMO. A shell fragment approximately five centimetres long entered through the eye socket, penetrated the cranial cavity, and became lodged in the brain, piercing the temporal lobe responsible for language. Surgeons at the Burdenko Main Military Clinical Hospital removed the foreign object while the patient remained conscious. During the operation, neurolinguists conducted language tests to ensure that language function was preserved.
HSE Scientists Use MEG for Precise Language Mapping in the Brain
Scientists at the HSE Centre for Language and Brain have demonstrated a more accurate way to identify the boundaries of language regions in the brain. They used magnetoencephalography (MEG) together with a sentence-completion task, which activates language areas and reveals their functioning in real time. This approach can help clinicians plan surgeries more effectively and improve diagnostic accuracy in cases where fMRI is not the optimal method. The study has been published in the European Journal of Neuroscience.
Transition to Sustainable Development Requires Deep Structural Transformation of Business
A group of researchers has proposed assessing the ESG transformation of businesses through the partner turnover ratio in raw material and distribution supply chains. The researchers note that the path towards sustainability requires a deep and often costly restructuring of partner networks. This and other papers were presented at the Third International Annual Conference ‘ESG Corporate Dynamics: the Challenges for Emerging Capital Markets.’
HSE Researchers Offer Guidance to Prevent Undergraduate Burnout
Researchers at the HSE Institute of Education have identified how much time students should ideally devote to their studies, extracurricular activities, and personal life to maintain strong academic performance without compromising their mental health. An analysis of responses from 2,753 students, combined with their actual academic results, revealed several risk factors—such as excessive homework—as well as positive factors, including sufficient sleep, regular exercise, and moderate participation in projects. Based on these findings, the researchers developed practical recommendations for both students and universities. The paper has been published in the European Journal of Education.
HSE Scientists Contribute to Development of Postquantum Ring Signature for Sber
A new cryptographic data protection mechanism has been jointly proposed by experts from the HSE Tikhonov Moscow Institute of Electronics and Mathematics, Sber, and QApp. The researchers have developed a postquantum ring signature scheme that ensures anonymity (within a defined group of participants), as well as the integrity and authentication of the source of digital transactions, even in the presence of an adversary equipped with a quantum computer.