Reports

Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), a consulting company, updated the sectoral rankings of universities for the year 2017. They show that in the Czech Republic, the Czech Technical University in Prague have been evaluated as the best institution in five fields. The survey included 4,438 universities around the world. CTU in Prague is now among the best universities in the world in seven of the 46 branches and two thematic areas.

Czech Technical University in Prague, along with a dozen foreign partners become part of the European project DA-SPACE. It secures conditions for implementin of new ideas and innovation. The aim of the DA-SPACE project (Open Innovation to Raise Entrepreneurship Skills and Public Private Partnership in the Danube Region), namely the Danube Transnational Interreg Program, is the creation of open innovation labs to support young innovators and their ideas set within the Danube river region.

Despite the adverse weather conditions on Saturday, 18 March, the Fík 2 stratospheric balloon was successfully launched at the Dlouha Lhota airport Příbram, carrying a new dosimetry system for research of cosmic radiation in the upper atmosphere in its gondola. The mechanical components of the new dosimeter were printed on a 3D printer developed by the Department of Radiation Dosimetry Institute of Nuclear Physics at the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. Students from the Faculty of Nuclear Sciences and Physical Engineering and the Faculty of Electrical Engineering were also involved in its development, led by the department staff. They worked on programming of the measuring device, the detector response to neutron field modeling, modelling of the balloon suspension filled with helium, practiced searching for the system in the field and also on the technical background of the project.

Petr Lhoťan, a second-year student of the CTU Faculty of Architecture, have won the student competitive exhibition Druhá kůže (Second Skin) with his project on the completion of a block in Karlin borough. The project was desinged in design studio of prof. Lábus, dean of the faculty.

On the Abu Dhabi Formula 1 racetrack, the YAS Arena, the prestigious Mohammed Bin Zayed International Robotics Challenge (MBZIRC) took place on 16 and 17 March. Here, the team of Dr. Martin Sasek of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, accompanied by a representative of the American University of Pennsylvania and the British University of Lincoln, won first place in the discipline of cooperative collection of objects using a group of autonomous helicopters and took silver position in the category of autonomous landing on a moving vehicle. This success earned the team the possibility to participate in the Grand Challenge competition, in which they have won the bronze medal together with colleagues from the Italian University of Padua.

On 8 March, prof. Petr Konvalinka, Rector CTU, and James Darroch, vice president of Global Mfg & Supply Chain FOXCONN CZ, signed agreement on cooperation. This is a follow up to the joint memorandum as it deepens the cooperation based on mutual sharing of expertise and training and research capacities of CTU. In cooperation with CTU academics, FOXCONN will participate on the topics for diploma and bachelor theses of CTU students, appropriately responding to the current needs of the commercial sector.

Representatives of the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics at CTU, signed an agreement on cooperation with Goodbaby company. Subject of the contract are innovative technologies. The company itself is engaged in production of goods for children such as strollers, car seats and other amenities.

Scientists from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and the University of Alberta in Canada have achieved major success in the field of artificial intelligence. The international team developed a computer program called Deepstack which in December 2016 beat professional players in one of the most popular card games in the world - Two player no-limit Texas hold'em poker, for the first time in history. Scientific discoveries that led to this result are published by the Science journal, one of the most prestigious scientific journals.

Institute of Spatial Planning at the Faculty of Architecture joined work on an international project called SAFERPLAY, subsidized by the EU Erasmus+ programme. Its main objective is to develop a BOC (badged Open Course - open course with digital badges). It will deal with innovative training in design, installation and maintenance of safe and stimulating spaces for play and games.

On Friday 10 February, Faculty of Nuclear Sciences and Physical Engineering joined the international project “Finding the Higgs boson decay of Z0” on the ATLAS experiment at the LHC, organized in cooperation with the International Group for popularizing Particle Physics, (IPPOG) the European Physical Society EPS and CERN on the occasion of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science due on 11 February.