News

There are pieces of news that are hard to believe. This applies also to the one about the decease of Vláďa Cháb, who was known for his immeasurable vitality and sporting spirit. Unfortunately, his great scientific and sporting heart stopped on the night of March 5, 2023, at the age of 76. When I heard about a month ago that he was not in good health, I did not pay much attention to the news. I believed that there was no illness or obstacle that Vláďa’s spirit could not handle. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

In HiLASE Centre, a new generation of diode-pumped lasers with high average power and high repetition frequency has been developed for a long time. We talked to Jan Brajer, a leading expert from the HiLASE Centre, about colours of the laser as well as success in laser shock peening.

On February 11, the International Day of Women and Girls in Science is celebrated. On this occasion, we decided to find out what status women in research have. Facts will be revealed, but in addition to graphs, we also offer interviews with female scientists working at the Institute of Physics. We wanted to find out why they chose physics and whether there are equal opportunities in physics.

Basic research in physics often consumes a great deal of energy, but there are visionaries who have been pushing through plans for how to save energy in the largest experiments for years. The chairman of the FZU's International Advisory Board, particle physicist Eckhard Elsen, is one of them. The former research director at CERN is also behind the upgrade plans for the particle accelerator - the High Luminosity Large Hadron Collider.

Single molecule circuits, where individual molecules are placed between two nano-electrodes, are ideal systems to create molecular-scale functional materials with the desired electronic properties. The potential implications are significant for nanoelectronics and could also help with climate change through more efficient nanoscale devices.

Karel Závěta was an important figure in condensed matter physics. 67 years ago, on the first of February 1956, he joined the then Institute of Technical Physics of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, today called the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences. He began his scientific career in the Department of Magnetism led by J. Brož. He became involved in the study of ferrites and continued in this area in cooperation with S. Krupička. The topic of his doctoral thesis was the use of electric conductivity to measure the magnetocaloric effect. For several years he held the post of the Science Secretary of the institute.

Will we be left with high electricity bills and is the transmission network in the Czech Republic sufficiently dimensioned? Current topics of the last months became the subject of the Current and Future Energy workshop, which was organized in the Solid21 lecture hall on January 17 by the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, where research into renewable sources is running e.g. within the Pilatus project.

The ELI Beamlines Research Facility, which houses some of the world's most intense laser systems, was transferred from the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences (FZU) to the ELI ERIC (Extreme Light Infrastructure ERIC) international research consortium at the beginning of this year. The centre in Dolní Břežany has thus joined the ranks of scientific centres such as CERN or the European Southern Observatory in Chile.

Our Universe is expanding faster and faster. What is the force behind it? Is it the fifth fundamental force predicted by some alternative theories of gravity? Scientists have chosen the Sun as their laboratory to find out.