ВЕЗИЛКА на годишна конференција на Школата за докторски студии при УКИМ 2026

The VEZILKA project took part in the ceremonial opening of the joint annual conference of doctoral studies at the Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje (UKIM), held on May 26, 2026, in the round hall of the UKIM Rectorate. The conference was opened by the Vice-Rector of the University, Prof. Dr. Sonja Topuzovska, and gathered doctoral students from across all faculties of the University. 

The keynote lecture was delivered by Professor Dimitar Trajanov, of the Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering, on the topic “The Evolution of Artificial Intelligence: From Models to Autonomous Agents.” The cross-disciplinary talk traced AI from statistical models to today’s autonomous agents, explaining how agents work, where they already succeed and where reliability still limits them, the risks and governance that come with systems that act, and what agentic AI means for doctoral research in every discipline, from the natural sciences to the humanities. Professor Trajanov also presented the Cognitive Obesity Hypothesis (Trajanov and Kocarev), a research-relevant reflection on what happens to our own thinking when we offload it to AI, and why doctoral researchers should use these tools with engaged skepticism. 

The lecture connected directly to VEZILKA, the North Macedonia AI Factory Antenna, which gives local researchers and universities direct access to European top-tier compute. Professor Trajanov invited doctoral students from all fields to build AI here rather than only consume it, by bringing a research problem in any of VEZILKA’s five strategic sectors, healthcare, energy, language and culture, agriculture, and public administration. In the proof-of-concept phase, VEZILKA offers researchers compute, mentorship, access to data where legally permitted, and legal support for EU AI Act and GDPR compliance, with cross-disciplinary teams and domain experts, not only computer scientists, explicitly welcome. 

Engaging the next generation of researchers in this way is central to VEZILKA’s vision: a North Macedonia that is not just a user of artificial intelligence, but its creator, one that keeps its young talent building their future here.