prof. Ing. Karel Ulbrich, DrSc.

Prof. Karel Ulbrich is a Head of the Department of Biomedical Polymers of the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. He is also Professor at the Prague Institute of Chemical Technology. He received his M.S. degree in polymer chemistry from the Prague Institute of Polymer Technology in 1970 and his Ph.D. degree in macromolecular sciences from the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, in 1975, where he received his tenure at the same year. In years 1994–1998 he was appointed Deputy Director and in years 1998–2007 Director of the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. He worked as Visiting Lecturer at the Johannes-Guttenberg University, Mainz in 1983, he spent a sabbatical as Visiting Professor in the Department of Bioengineering (1989) and Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry (1992) at the University of Utah, USA. He was appointed at the same university Adjunct Professor in the Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry. Karel Ulbrich is a member of the Learned Society of the Czech Republic. He is a member of editorial boards of eight renowned international chemistry journals and he is a member of Scientific Board of the Faculty of Chemical Technology, University of Chemical Technology, Prague, Scientific Board of the Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Scientific Board of the Polymer Institute, Slovak Academy of Sciences and Scientific Board of Faculty of Natural Sciences, Charles University, Prague. His research interests have focused on the development of water-soluble polymeric carriers of drugs designed as targetable drug-release systems, development of biodegradable hydrogels for controlled drug release, and on the development of polymer carrier systems for gene delivery. He is the author or coauthor of more than 250 original papers published in peer-reviewed journals and 35 patents, mostly from the area of controlled drug delivery systems. His work was cited more than 5 000 times (SCI). Since 2003 he is a Chairman of the Committee for conferring the DSc. degree in Macromolecular Chemistry, since 2007 1st Vice-chairman of a Gremium for conferring the DSc. degree at the Academy of Science of the Czech Republic and since 2009 Chairman of this body. For achievements in macromolecular chemistry he was awarded the Award of the Learned Society of the Czech Republic in 1996, the Award of Ministry of Education of the Czech Republic in 2002, Honorary Medal of the Polymer Institute of Slovak Academy of Sciences in 2004, award Invention Ceska hlava in 2005 and award “Praemium Academiae 2008”, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic.