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On 27 November 2019, GACR President signed a memorandum of understanding with the Swiss National Science Foundation on bilateral cooperation on the Lead Agency principle. This new cooperation enables scientists from the Czech Republic to carry out scientific projects in basic research with new foreign partners. The first call is announced now with the SNSF in the role of a Lead Agency. Projects duration is maximum 3 years.
Detailed rules for submitting project proposals under the new LA cooperation will be published at the beginning of 2020.
Notification by Swiss Agency
There are hundreds of thousands of known asteroids in the Solar System. We have detailed information on only a few thousand of them so far. The Czech Republic is a world power in creating models of these cosmic bodies. The GACR project “A big picture of the main asteroid belt – physical properties of asteroids derived by inversion of optical and infrared photometry” focused on the analysis of data on asteroids. The team led by doc. Mgr. Josef Ďurech, Ph.D., achieved to describe more than a thousand new cosmic bodies.
In the area of asteroids modelling, the Czech Republic is the most productive in the world and these models are used by scientists around the world for further research and measurement. The results also serve for further basic research, for example to derive and obtain further information about the asteroid, such as its thermophysical parameters etc.
doc. Mgr. Josef Ďurech, Ph.D.
Astronomical Institute of Charles University
Most of us perhaps know that we divide burns by intensity into four basic groups. Even though extensive burns can be fatal, modern ways of treatment greatly improved the treatment results. Scientists are currently working on full replacement of the burnt skin.
One of them is Ing. Alena Řezníčková Ph.D., who has been dealing with this task for three years as part of the project “Physically deposited and anchored metal nanostructures on solid substrate”. The main objective of the project was to modify the surface of the sample, polymer or glass, using physical and chemical methods to improve its properties for medical and electronics applications. The polymeric substrate itself is inert and therefore not suitable for other applications.
Ing. Alena Řezníčková Ph.D.
Department of Solid State Engineering
On Monday 17 June 2019, the highest representatives of GACR, FWF (Austria), NCN (Poland) and ARRS (Slovenia) solemnly signed the “CEUS – Central European Science Partnership” Lead Agency Agreement: Memorandum of Understanding on the unilateral administration and mutual recognition of evaluation procedures. This new cooperation enables scientists from the Czech Republic, Austria, Poland and Slovenia to carry out scientific projects with new foreign partners based on the Lead Agency evaluation, which is among the increasingly preferred forms of cooperation between foreign agencies supporting basic research due to reduction of administrative burden. Within the CEUS initiative supporting basic research in the Central European region, scientists will be enabled to submit bilateral and also trilateral project proposals on the LA principle.
In brief:
- It is possible to submit bilateral and trilateral projects in the first call.
- Projects duration is maximum 3 years.
- First project proposals will be accepted from 22 February 2020, when detailed rules will be published as well.
- Within bilateral and multilateral LA cooperation, the main criterion for determination of “Lead” agency will be stipulated in international memoranda. The main criterion is the budget amount of the international team, via which the project is submitted. On the basis of this “Lead” criterion, scientists determine the national LA agency that will evaluate the project proposal.
- Bilateral projects: at least 40 % of total project costs must be requested with the “Lead” agency
- Trilateral projects: at least 25 % of total project costs must be requested with the “Lead” agency
- The Lead Agency is the only agency that will evaluate the projects from the scientific perspective.
- Partner agencies evaluate the formal and financial part of their national applicants’ project proposals.
- In case GACR becomes the Lead Agency, the proposals will be evaluated by advisory bodies of GACR, in accordance with concluded partnership agreements on mutual cooperation and in accordance with individual agreements concluded between partner organizations, in such a way as the level of quality of LA project proposals recommended for funding is not lower than the level of quality of project proposals recommended for funding under standard projects.
Five Principal Investigators of the top basic research projects received the GACR President’s Award 2019. In contrast to last year, when one female investigator was awarded, male investigators dominated this year’s award.
Zdeněk Sofer succeeded with a project investigating the application of ion beams for modifications of graphene-based structures. Jiří Bruthans examined the effect of gravity-induced stress on sandstone erosion. Marek Mráz’s project focused on studying the regulation of B cell receptor (BCR) signalling pathway by microRNAs. Laureate Václav Štětka analysed the role of social media in transformation of political communication and citizen participation in the Czech Republic. Another laureate, Robert Černý, focused on oro-pharyngeal interface during vertebrate primary mouth formation. The GACR presidium decided on the winners among dozens of different projects.
“Yet again, choosing the best projects has been extremely difficult this year. We face the challenge of selecting the best projects among dozens of projects every year. On the other hand, it is a good message on how brilliant scientists in our country are. Congratulations to award winners, their projects were indeed excellent,” Alice Valkárová, the GACR president, stated.
The GACR President’s Award was established in 2003. Since then, 69 awards have been given in response to the excellent results in carrying out basic research projects supported by GACR. This year’s five awarded projects were selected out of 448 projects that ended last year, based on proposals of the respective discipline committees. The GACR presidium decided on the final selection of projects for the GACR President’s Award this April.
The prize is awarded for excellent results in basic research projects that had been supported by GACR. The Principal Investigators of the chosen projects and their co-workers receive a financial reward. Every year, the award goes to four to five Principal Investigators, whose projects were completed in the previous year, received a nomination for the award and acquired excellent evaluation by expert advisory bodies.
doc. Ing. Pavel Jelínek, Ph.D.
Doc. Ing. Pavel Jelínek, Ph.D. from the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences together with his team was able to differentiate chemical structure of molecules on the surface of solid substance. The scientist developed comprehensive physical mechanism theory of this scanning. The key for obtaining this sub-molecular contrast is the placement of one molecule (e.g. carbon monoxide) or atom at the end of the metallic probe. The presence of the flexible particle at the end of the probe causes the strengthening of the signal which then enables to achieve unprecedented resolution of the molecules. This new method also proved the validity of the equation of the Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling for the covalent bond from the 1930s.
Mgr. Pavel Němec, Ph.D.
Project of Mgr. Pavel Něměc, Ph.D. from the Faculty of Science, Charles University in Prague revealed the anatomical nature of bird intelligence and therefore solved the mystery why some birds are extremely intelligent although their brains are small. The research of Mgr. Pavel Němec, Ph.D. proved that small brains of birds contain substantial number of neurons. Despite the fact that the largest brains of Passeriformes weigh around 16 grams and the largest brains of parrots weigh about 25 grams, the brains contain equal number of neurones as primate brains which are significantly larger. This research proved that neither absolute nor relative size of the brain is a proper measure of cognitive abilities. It is rather dependent on the cellular composition and neural density. The results of the research were reported by the media worldwide.
doc. Ing. Filip Šroubek, Ph.D., DSc
Project of doc. Ing. Filip Šroubek, Ph.D., DSc. from the Institute of Information Theory and Automation of the Czech Academy of Sciences was aimed at the blurred photographs. Doc. Ing. Filip Šroubek, Ph.D., DSc. and his team developed mathematical models which enable to refocus blurred digital photographs. The main step of this project was to precisely mathematically model the process of image scanning. It is possible to use this method in photography and other fields such as astronomy, ophthalmology or nuclear medicine. The results were published in 15 scientific journals and were presented at many prestigious foreign conferences.
Prof. RNDr. Blanka Říhová, DrSc.
Project of Prof. RNDr. Blanka Říhová, DrSc. from the Institute of Microbiology of the Czech Academy of Sciences brought hopeful results in the field of tumour cells and cytostatic agents. The current advancement in chemotherapy is mainly aimed at the development of new types of cytostatic agents with lower toxicity which inhibit the creation of resistance. The resistance to particular cytostatic agent and multidrug resistance (MDR) is a frequent reason for the failure of chemotherapy. The project team brought new findings proving that the systems for medicaments transfer based on HPMA copolymer conjugates carrying cytostatic agents and P-gp inhibitors are capable to effectively overcome gained and natural multidrug resistance. The results were published in series of scientific journals in the Czech Republic and abroad.
Mgr. Sylvie Graf, Ph.D. and doc. PhDr. Martina Hřebíčková, Dr., DSc.
Project which was carried out by Mgr. Sylvie Graf, Ph.D. and doc. PhDr. Martina Hřebíčková, Dr., DSc. from the Institute of Psychology of the Czech Academy of Sciences focused on the possible approaches to prejudice reduction. The scientists concentrated on relationships between participants from neighbouring nations in Central Europe. Based on the unique data from Central Europe, the two scientists have proven that negative experience has a relatively higher impact on increasing prejudice than positive experience on decreasing it. However, the positive experience occurs more frequently which then ultimately balances and reduces the higher impact of negativity on the prejudice. Outcomes of this project are presented in the monography “Czechs and their neighbours. Intergroup attitudes and contact in Central Europe.” and article in “European Journal of Social Psychology”.
