Plovdiv Science Festival 2026: Events in English
The fourth Plovdiv Science Festival is being held from October 22 to 25 2026, and includes events in English.
October 22, 5.30pm, Cosmos Hall:
Bread for the future: enhancing the resilience of crops in the era of global environmental stress
Scientists at the Centre of Plant Systems Biology and Biotechnology (CPSBB) in Plovdiv are studying a biostimulant made from extracts of seaweed from the Atlantic Ocean. The aim is to explore how these extracts can support plant growth, improve resilience to environmental stress, and help maintain crop productivity.
Dr. Aakansha Kanojia will explain how seaweed extracts work and how they can be used to improve plant performance under different growing conditions. The talk will explore their effects on maize and tomato grown under normal and drought-stress conditions, as well as on pepper and aubergine grown under practical field conditions. We will examine how crops respond to water limitation and gain insights into how seaweed extracts can improve plant performance under both stress and non-stress conditions.
Finally, we will take a closer look at what happens inside plants at the molecular and physiological levels, exploring the mechanisms through which seaweed extracts may help plants respond to stress and support crop growth and productivity.
Dr. Kanojia is a plant molecular biologist and Research Scientist at the CPSBB) in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. She obtained her Ph.D. in Plant Biology from Massey University, New Zealand. Her research focuses on understanding how plants respond and adapt to environmental stresses such as drought and heat, and how this knowledge can be used to improve crop resilience and productivity.
She works with crops including maize, tomato, pepper, eggplant and lettuce, combining plant physiology with molecular biology, transcriptomics and metabolomics. She has contributed to several European-funded research projects investigating sustainable approaches, including plant biostimulants, to improve crop performance under challenging environmental conditions. Beyond the laboratory, Aakansha is also passionate about science communication and uses art and painting to communicate scientific ideas to wider audiences.
October 25, 10.30am, Hall DNA:
Fossil hunt! (for children aged 10 to 15)
We will go fossil hunting today! But we will do this right here from the Festival together with paleontologist Dr. Michael Sandy during this hands on activity!
Participants will work in pairs and working together will clean and sort through a sample of fossil-rich sediment from North Carolina, US. In this sediment there are some tiny complete fossils (a few mm in length) and also a lot of shell fragments from shelled-creatures (also fossils). From the collected fossils participants will identify their fossils and then consider what fossils can tell us about the past (the sediment and fossils are around 15 million years old).
Fossils from Bulgaria and elsewhere will be discussed in the remaining time as well as ideas about where to see more fossils and learn more.
Dr. Sandy spent his professional career as a teacher and researcher of geology in the UK and the US. Today he lives in Bulgaria and continues his passion for the fascinating world of fossils and geology through public outreach.
In English with translation into Bulgarian.
Parents are requested to sign up only their children for this workshop while visiting one of our adult events at the same time.
October 25, 3pm, Hall Cosmos:
The Shape of Water
(Ticket: 4 euro)
How much water does it take to survive on Mars? Less than one elephant drinks in four days. That’s the kind of question Earth & space explorer Niamh Shaw has had to answer in real life!
Niamh has lived on rationed water in a Mars simulation, tracked penguins across the Antarctic, and been sniffed out by a hungry polar bear in the Arctic. Now she’s bringing it all to Science Week.
The Shape of Water is a wild, funny, hands-on adventure for families. Watch ice melt in real time. Find out who copes better with the cold – you or a penguin. Try the blubber glove challenge. Meet the animals who’ve cracked survival tricks humans haven’t. And hear real stories from the ice, the desert, and a simulated Mars mission, told by someone who’s actually been there.
Big questions, brilliant facts, real adventure. Bring the kids – and your sense of wonder.
Niamh Shaw is an Irish scientist, engineer, STEM communicator, writer, and performer. Shaw was the 2019–2020 Honorary Ambassador for the Irish Girl Guides. Her first book, Dream Big: An Irishwoman’s Space Odyssey, published by Mercier Press tells the story of her 40-year quest to fulfill her childhood dream.
In English.
In partnership with the Embassy of Ireland, marking Ireland’s presidency of the Council of Europe.
To obtain tickets, please visit the website of the festival’s organiser, the Beautiful Science Foundation.
