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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Science
• vaccination
• Petr Volf
• parasitology

• Marcela Uhlíková
• Michal Novotný, Jovana Sádlová, Petr Volf

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.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Science
• research
• czexpats
• termites
• Japan

• Pavla Hubálková
• Aleš Buček's personal archive

There are more than 3‚000 species of termites, and their combined mass is greater than the combined mass of all human beings on the planet. They’re best known as pests that can gnaw through your house, but only in recent years has more research been done into their significance for the ecosystem.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• coronavirus threat
• Videos
• vaccination
• Motol University Hospital
• Neuron Endowment Fund

• Hynek Glos, Neuron NF

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.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Shakespeare
• versification studies
• machine learning
• Petr Plecháč
• Martin Hilský

• Luboš Wišniewski

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.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• economics
• labour markets
• quality of life

Much of the focus of IDEA, a think-tank of the Economics Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences, which is part of CERGE-EI, is tied this year to the novel coronavirus, and anti-Covid measures. However, that is far from its only activity: this week the think tank hosted an online conference examining the influence of public policy on labour markets.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Science
• novel coronavirus

• Pavla Hubálková
• René Volfík, GeneSpector archive

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

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Written by: Pavla Hubálková

Category: Science

• Science
• research
• interviews
• coronavirus

• René Volfík, GeneSpector archive
• Zpráva dne: Ne

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.

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Science
• coronavirus
• Humans of CU

• Vladimír Šigut, Shutterstock

A number of deadly viruses are believed to have originated in bats, including Ebola and the original SARS. The indications are that the novel coronavirus SARS-Cov-2 also made the jump from bats, most likely through an intermediary species.

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Written by: Marcela Uhlíková

Category: Science

• Science
• coronavirus threat
• interviews
• women of CU

• Luboš Wišniewski, Ivo Wondráček
• Zpráva dne: Ne

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”.

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Written by: Martin Rychlík

Category: Science

• Luboš Wišniewski

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.

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Written by: Pavla Hubálková

Category: Science

• Humans of CU
• mathematics

• Vladimír Šigut

“Most of my work still takes place on paper,” says theoretical mathematician Zdeněk Dvořák from the Computer Science Institute of Charles University. He focuses on combinatorics, graph theory, and theoretical informatics, and he received the ERC CZ Consolidator Grant for his research.

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Written by: Martin Rychlík

Category: Science

• Hynek Glos, Alessandro Testa archive

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.

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Written by: Pavla Hubálková

Category: Science

• coronavirus threat
• research

• Shutterstock

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?

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Written by: Jan Velinger

Category: Science

• Luboš Wišniewski

Anthropologists at Charles University and colleagues from three American universities recently published the findings of a joint-study examining dehydration and persistence hunting by modern humans’ predecessor Homo erectus.

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Written by: Marcela Uhlíková

Category: Science

• Science
• research

• Marie Bulínová, Guillaume Lamarche-Gagnon

“I have actually never done anything else,” is how Marek Stibal, who has been studying biological processes in glacial ecosystems for almost 20 years.