Reports

Ten years since its opening, the Network Multimedia Laboratory (SAGElab) at Faculty of Information Technology of Czech Technical University in Prague (FIT CTU) celebrated its 10th anniversary. The aim of the laboratory is to support teaching and education of professionals in the fields of network technologies, multimedia and virtual reality. In addition, the lab also creates a space for research and development of new network applications. SAGElab is a joint workplace of CTU FIT and CESNET association. What is its current equipment and what activities or projects does it address?

Rector of CTU Vojtěch Petráček and Director of the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics of CTU Ondřej Velek today welcomed the Latvian delegation - Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Economy of Latvia Mr. Jurgis Miezainis and Senior Expert of the Ministry of Economy Ms. Angelina Bekas, who were accompanied by Deputy Ambassador to the Czech Republic Mr. Janis Vaivars.

CTU will host the first annual DroneCon conference, organized by the weekly magasine Euro on Thursday, 4 April. The guests were first addressed by the Minister of Transport Martin Kupka in a video greeting, then the conference was opened by the Rector of the CTU Vojtech Petráček directly in the Respirium of the CTU building in Prague 6.

The conference entitled "On the Importance of Cooperation between Academia and the Defence Forces of the Czech Army" was another follow-up to the Memorandum of Cooperation concluded between CTU and the Army last April. In addition to the President of the Czech Republic, its main guests and speakres were the Chief of the General Staff of the Czech Armed Forces Karel Řehka, the Ambassador-in-Charge of the Permanent Representation of the Czech Republic to the European Union Edita Hrdá and the host, the Rector of the CTU in Prague Vojtěch Petráček.

Affordable autonomously controlled aerial robot with precise positioning and high quality 3D digital mapping for first responding firefighting units intervening in cluttered building interiors. This is what the winning drone that emerges from the 3D Mapping Challenge/UAS 5.0 competition should look like. The Multirobotic Systems group from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at CTU succeeded in the semi-finals and advanced to the finals, which will take place April 9-11 in Kansas. A total of 11 teams that have passed the previous two rounds will compete for prizes worth a total of $987,500.

The first ever European Programming Championship has its winners. Students from the University of Warsaw take home the gold in the International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC). The best of the Czech representatives, the CTU team, finished 25th out of 52 competitors in Sunday's final. The competition was hosted by the Czech Technical University from 22 to 24 March in Prague - Dejvice.

CTU in Prague has never had and to this date has no financial obligation to any state institution. This was confirmed by the just completed audit of the Financial Adminstration. All doubts were unjustified and the school maintains its good name.

The Bethlehem Chapel resounded with the tones of compositions by Josef Suk, Bedřich Smetana and W. A. Mozart performed by the Wihan Quartet, while the clarinet solo belonged to Anna Paulová during Mozart's Stadler Quintet.

Our colleagues are also dedicated to modern methods in food production at the Institute of Instrumentation and Control Engineering of Faculty of Mechanical Engineering. One of the research activities is the optimization of the algorithm for hydroponic cultivation with the Ebb and Flow system. In this system, plants are placed in tubs into which nutrient solution is filled at intervals for a defined period of time and then drained again.

The Czech branch of Siemens awarded the Werner von Siemens Prizes 2023 to the best students, young scientists, and teachers. The first place in the number of awards went to the Czech Technical University in Prague, with all six awards going to the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the CTU. This is followed by the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic (5 winners) and Brno University of Technology (3 winners), Palacký University in Olomouc and Masaryk University (2 winners each), Charles University and the University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice (1 winner each). The expert juries selected winners from 496 applications, 20 awardees shared one million crowns. Women accounted for 29% of the total entries and 25% of the prize winners. Along with the students, the supervisors and mentors of their work also received a prize.