Sleep is Karel Blahna’s focus of research. At the Biomedical Center at Charles University’s Faculty of Medicine in Plzeň, he looks into how the brain’s sleep activity changes in sickness and health. He was able to put together a team and conduct research thanks to support from CU’s Primus programme.

A team of Czech parasitologists from CU’s Faculty of Science has been working with researchers from Great Britain, Israel, and Canada to develop an effective vaccine preventing against leishmaniasis, a parasitic disease transmitted by sand flies. The results of their study were published in the prestigious journal Nature Communications.

Even though vaccination for Covid-19 has begun in the Czech Republic, there are still many people who remain sceptical and have expressed fear or doubts. Anyone among the broader public wanting to view a serious debate on the matter should look up a discussion that was live this week organised by the Neuron Endowment Fund.

Petr Plecháč, completing a Ph.D. at Charles University, made world headlines with his analysis of Shakespeare’s Henry VIII. It was long accepted that the play was co-authored by playwright John Fletcher, but Plecháč’s study – using machine learning – analysed word frequency patterns and rhythms to provide further evidence that the play was a collaborative effort. Henry VIII was not written by Shakespeare alone.

Lab contributed to testing and put years of experience into new commercial kit

For 30 years Professor Stanislav Kmoch has devoted himself to the research of rare diseases; during the coronavirus pandemic, his laboratory was able to apply significant know-how in the development of new diagnostic kits for the detection of Covid-19.

f the novel coronavirus had never hit, Ruth Tachezy would have been doing other things: applying for funding, heading a national reference laboratory, and publishing. She would have been helping her students at the Faculty of Science and would have been preparing for an upcoming conference and a mountaineering vacation. Instead, she opted to tackle a higher “mountain”.

Last year, three young researchers at Charles University won the Neuron Prize for promising scientists in the Czech Republic. One of them was astrophysicist Ondřej Pejcha, an expert on binary stars who studied at CU and at Princeton University.

Italian scientist Alessandro Testa has already written three book-length monographs. The works, published in Italian, focus on the relationship between ancient myths and modern mythology, folk carnivals and the history of religiosity in the region he himself comes from.

An investigation into the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) has examined how long it can survive on different surfaces. If someone touches a contaminated item – a set of keys, their phone, or even cash – can they get sick?