“And how will I recognize you?” I asked Kateřina Schlöglová, a geology student at the Charles University Faculty of Science and the main organizer of the Mineral Resources for the Society conference that I was planning to visit. “You definitely won’t miss a female geologist in high heels. They look kind of out of place and dainty compared to her usual footwear – hiking boots.”

The interuniversity team of MUDr. Václav Liška, Ph.D., has been testing a software model of the liver tissue at the Faculty of Medicine in Pilsen which is able to compute the possibilities of the regeneration of an organ after  large surgery. It should  help mainly oncology patients soon.

Museums and art galleries usually display outstanding works of art. In the case of the Culture Collection of Fungi (CCF) of the Department of Botany of the Charles University Faculty of Science, the unique exhibits on display are mushrooms. And it is not totally off the point to compare mushrooms to works of art.

More than 200 pre-school children and almost 250 elementary school pupils from the second district of Prague, which is also the home of the Faculty of Science, participated in the faculty’s special children’s day on September 13. In the faculty’s Botanical Garden, kids were exploring where gold comes from and what an engorged tick looks like under the microscope. The patient ones could even count how many flies a carnivorous plant can catch in an hour.

The race bearing the name “Taják” has probably the longest tradition among the regular contests organized by the Faculty of Physical Education and Sport (FPES). In the evening of Wednesday, October 19, the 42nd annual race was held – this time the venue of the Hostivař dam was chosen from among Prague’s woods and parks.

“Educating doctoral students is one of the main priorities of the Faculty of Science”, says Doc. RNDr. Vojtěch Ettler, Ph.D., Vice-Dean for doctoral programmes at the faculty. This priority gave birth do the STARS programme.

Are gardening colonies a relic of the past or are they still an important part of today’s urban society? What makes people travel to the garden areas? Will city gardens still exist in the future? Answers to these questions are being sought by a research team headed by Mgr. et Mgr. Arnošt Novák from the department of social and cultural ecology at the Charles University Faculty of Humanities.

“Research cannot be fully planned and you never know what you will discover”, says the Creativity Award recipient, assistant professor Martin Čížek from the Charles University Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, the co-author of a paper published in the prestigious journal Science. The theoretical physicist, whose calculations influenced the models of the formation of first nebulas and starts after the Big Bang, is a fan of the Big Bang Theory TV show.

David Storch’s work at the Center for Theoretical Study focuses on macroecology and evolutionary ecology. He is currently involved in two projects investigating the processes that determine natural diversity.

The majority of Charles University students have no idea that water-pipe smoking is more harmful than cigarette smoking – according to a poll carried out by fourth-year students from the Charles University First Faculty of Medicine. Two thirds of almost 700 respondents displayed alarming ignorance as they believed that the hubble-bubble was safer than or equally harmful as cigarette smoking.

The Charles University Faculty of Science decided to organize an adventure suburban camp for fearless boys and girls aged 6–15 who are interested in nature and sciences. For a whole week from August 15–20 a varied and entertaining programme was prepared for the kids.

Ninth World Shakespeare Congress will take place in Prague from 17 to 22 July 2011. The general theme is “Renaissance Shakespeare: Shakespeare Renaissances and the organisers are the International Shakespeare Association, Charles University and the National Theatre. The principal partners are the City of Prague and Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. The Congress will be attended by approximately 600 Shakespeare scholars, Elizabethan literature and theatre specialists from all continents.

Pyšek on April 7, 2010 in the Great Hall of Karolinum. Professor Pyšek has spent two decades studying plant invasions, a topic he is also working on with his doctoral students at the Charles University Faculty of Science. Last year, 17 papers that he wrote or co-wrote were published in impact journals.

On April 27, 2010, RNDr. Jana Poltierová Vejpravová, Ph.D., received the prestigious Scopus Award for young scientists for her work which is a major contribution to experimental and theoretical description of spin states in solid-state matters. The awards were handed out for the first time in the Czech Republic by the largest publisher of scientific journals and databases, Elsevier Science.

Photo: Marie Čechová

On May 13, RNDr. Marie Kalbáčová, Ph.D. from the Institute of Inherited Metabolic Disorders of the Charles University 1st Faculty of Medicine, received the L'Oréal For Women in Science scholarship for her work “Interaction of Cells and Nanomaterials: New Perspectives of Implantology and Bioelectronics”.

Over two thirds of people in the Czech Republic do not know what the most frequent cause of death related to smoking. It has been shown by a survey, which was conducted in March by 5^th year students of the Charles University 1^st Faculty of Medicine. Around 18,000 Czechs die of smoking-related causes every year.

The “Academic Lessons for Economic Policy” conference took place on May 12 in the building of the Institute of Economic Studies in Opletalova Street in Prague. Attracting great interest from students, experts and the general public, the conference also celebrated the 20^th anniversary of the Faculty of Social Sciences and 20 years of state-independent economics in the Czech Republic.

The autumn course named “The sociologist as an involved observer, or How to write sociology for the media”, which took place in September 20 – 25 in the Faculty of Social Sciences’ Hollar building, was a joint project of the Faculty’s Institute of Sociology (ISS) and the Lidové Noviny newspaper (LN). It was focused at doctoral and advanced graduate students of sociology and related disciplines. Jan Maršálek from the ISS served as the project’s coordinator.

The Fernando Gil Award, which includes a generous monetary prize, is sometimes called the Nobel Prize for philosophy. The first annual award was granted to Professor Ladislav Kvasz, a member of the Department of Mathematics and Didactics of Mathematics since 2007, for his book called Patterns of Change: Linguistic Innovations in the Development of Classical Mathematics, which bridges the disciplines of mathematics and philosophy.

Between September 22-25, Prague hosted the annual meeting of the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology (ESPE). Dr. Jan Lebl, head of the Paediatric Clinic of the Charles University 2nd Faculty of Medicine led the organisation team and was appointed the president of Society for this year.