Press releases

Multiscale materials are assembled from different types of nanomaterials, which themselves have unusual properties. By combining and integrating them into higher-order hierarchies, smart matter with unique functionalities and surprising applications in many different fields can be obtained. A consortium of eight partners from academia and research, led by the J. Heyrovský Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences, has received financial support from the Programme Johannes Amos Comenius of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports. Specifically, it was the Excellent Research Call aimed at supporting research with the potential for excellent results applicable in practice.

Professor Pavel Jungwirth and his colleagues from the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences and from the cochlear implant company MED-EL, based in Austria, have come up with a complete computer model of the ear. It can be used to simulate hearing of mammals including humans from the outer ear all the way to the auditory nerve. The results of their research have been published in the journal Hearing Research recently. This model will not only facilitate the further research of the human ear but may also help to improve and better adjust compensation devices for people with hearing impairment including cochlear implants.

The team of Professor Michal Hocek at IOCB Prague explores the limits of the structure and function of DNA and successfully pushes forward known boundaries. An article presenting the results of their latest research has just been published in the major scientific journal Nucleic Acid Research. They prove that even heavily modified double helices of DNA are stable enough to be used for special applications. This discovery might expand the possibilities of utilizing modified DNA, for example, in medicine.

Researchers from the Jan Dobeš laboratory have made a significant discovery uncovering a novel immune response in the intestinal epithelium Furthermore, their study delineates a mechanism that controls this immune response.. Their findings were recently published in the renowned Journal of Experimental Medicine in a paper authored by Tomáš Brabec and other members of Jan Dobeš's laboratory at the Faculty of Science, Charles University. The study was a collaborative effort involving scientists from Martin Schwarzer's and Dominik Filipp's laboratories at the Czech Academy of Sciences, as well as Jakub Abramson from the Weizmann Institute in Israel.

Damaged nerve fibres in the spinal cord could be restored by gene therapy, which could then trigger the recovery and growth of axons, the outgrowths of nerve fibres. Successful experiments on laboratory animals have been carried out by scientists at the Institute of Experimental Medicine of the CAS. Rats have regained sensitivity in their hind limbs to almost pre-injury levels. Scientists have been working for six years to develop treatment methods for nerve diseases.

Thanks to the combined efforts of two departments of the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the CAS, a new cause of cancer, specifically leukaemia, has been discovered. Experts identified new mutations in the PPM1D gene that sabotage the work of the 'guardians' of the human genome, enabling cancers cells to spread rapidly. The research shows that these findings can also be used to fight leukaemia.

In cooperation with specialists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the Masaryk Institute and Archives of the CAS is developing unique software that will enable researchers to search through and contextualise a tremendous number of digitised historical sources and evaluate them using artificial intelligence. The software will be made available online to the public within the next year. The researchers’ goal is to integrate the new software with archives, libraries, and other institutions around the world.

Over the next three years, nearly two hundred children and their parents, researchers at the Czech Academy of Sciences, will benefit from a substantial financial donation. The funds will go towards the administration of six children’s groups in Prague and subsidized places for children in Brno. The parents of the youngest children will thus find it easier to combine their childcare duties with those of their demanding scientific careers.

Arthropods - creatures with jointed legs that contain today's crabs, beetles, or spiders - are the most successful animal group that ever existed on Earth. They contain over 1,200,000 described species, represent most of the animal biomass, and are one of the most fundamental parts of both marine and terrestrial ecosystems. Not only do their adults dominate the land and sea, but their juvenile and larval stages are as important as the mature individuals.

A loss of NEUROD1 leads to severe diabetes. However, the clinical, pathophysiological, and molecular characteristics of NEUROD1 mutations remain unclear. In a new study published in Nature Communications, researchers from the Institute of Biotechnology CAS, BIOCEV and from the Institute of Clinical and Experimental Medicine elucidate the crucial role of NEUROD1 in the development and maintenance of the endocrine pancreas.