Special Criteria for Student Research Papers Submitted for the Competition in Natural Sciences

You can participate in the competition if you are:

A student at HSE University or one of its regional campuses.

An HSE alumnus who graduated in 2023 from HSE University or one of its regional campuses.

A student or an alumnus of another university (including international institutions) who graduated in 2023.

Conditions and Limitations

Research papers submitted for the competition must be original and can be prepared by one author or in collaboration with other students, with a maximum of five contributors.

Each participant is allowed to submit up to two distinct works for the competition, with ONLY ONE submission permitted per category (field).

If a research paper is prepared by a Bachelor's, Specialist, and Master's student as co-authors, the MASTER's student should be the one submitting the paper.

We accept research papers written in either Russian or English.

All requirements for the paper design and formatting can be found in Annexes 1 and 2, as well as in the recommendations posted on the website (refer to the paragraph addressing special requirements for specific fields).

If your paper does not meet these requirements, you will be notified within 7 working days from the date of submission. Violating the requirements does not disqualify you from participating in the competition. If the deadline has not passed, you have the opportunity to address any shortcomings and resubmit your work.

Please note that research papers created in collaboration with an academic supervisor are NOT eligible for the competition.

Olga Tarabaeva, a member of the subject committee under the Organizing Committee of the Student Research Paper competition, shared some insights on co-authorship:

A research paper submitted for the competition should be independently prepared by the author, without assistance from others.

However, if a student solely focuses on their own contributions without acknowledging the broader context of the research, it may result in a loss of coherence and clarity in the work. This could leave reviewers wondering about the purpose and significance of the research. Therefore, while it's acceptable for the author to describe the research conducted by their group, it's crucial to clearly delineate their individual contributions and specify their role in the collective effort.

Formatting Rules

Remove all references to authors, co-authors, and academic supervisor from the title page, text, and footers. IMPORTANT! Information about the author/authors, academic supervisor, and the author's place of study should ONLY be specified in the application when submitting the paper (except for the Mathematics category).  The title page should NOT contain any references for your home university and city; it should only state the title of your paper and keywords.

Make sure your paper is up to 60,000 characters long, including spaces. This volume includes the bibliography, all appendices, title page, and contents.

Save your file in one of the following formats: .doc, .docx, .rtf or .pdf. The file size should not exceed 200 MB.

Please do not submit borrowed work.  The Organizing Committee will disqualify all papers containing plagiarism, and their author will lose eligibility to participate in any future competitions.

Please make sure to submit one paper in one category (field), or two distinct papers in two different categories. If you submit one paper in more than one category or more than one paper in the same category, your application will be rejected.

Your paper must include three sections:

Introduction: This section provides an assessment of the current state of the research problem you are exploring, discusses its relevance and scientific novelty, and outlines the goals and objectives of the research.

Main Body: In this section, you should present data reflecting the essence of your research, provide justification for the selected methods of addressing the identified problems, and offer a description of the results obtained through the research process.

Conclusion: This section should contain concise conclusions drawn from the results of the conducted research and discuss the practical applications of the obtained results, particularly if your research has applied implications.

A list of sources and appendices (if applicable). Make sure to provide a bibliography at the end of your paper, formatted in line with the guidelines outlined in GOST and/or the standards of leading international and Russian scientific journals.

Application Package

Application: This document includes details about your chosen competition category (field), nomination, as well as information about the author, co-authors, and the academic supervisor (if applicable).

Copy of Student ID or Study Certificate: Required for participants who are not students of HSE University.

Copy of Academic Credentials: Participants who are not graduates of HSE University must provide a copy of their academic credentials, such as a diploma or degree certificate, to validate their educational background.

Research Paper: The text of the research paper submitted to the competition