Events
Accelerator Summer school
Accelerator Summer School, June 16–20, 2025, CATRIN-RCPTM, Holice campus
CATRIN, as part of the ERA Chair–Accelerator project, is organizing a summer school for students of Palacký University engaging primarily in science but also in humanities. We’ve prepared a five-day programme packed with interesting workshops and lectures. It’s aimed at everybody who wants to get new insights into technology transfer or innovative management. But not only these, we’ll also touch upon topics like work-life balance or how to write a successful project proposal. On top of that, we’ll equip you with new English-language skills, so that you’ll be able to create a really good scientific presentation and communicate your science in general. All the lectures will be delivered in the English language.
There’s no registration fee! Lunch and coffee breaks are included. The capacity is limited. If you want to apply, you can do it here.
Time: From Monday, June 16th to Friday, June 20th. You can do the whole week or only selected days
Venue: CATRIN-RCPTM, Šlechtitelů 27, Olomouc-Holice, budova G1.
1st Innovative Drug Discovery Symposium
Date: May, 5th – 8th
Location: Mikulov, Czechia, Hotel Galant
The Face of Modern Drug Discovery The field of modern drug discovery is advancing at an unprecedented pace. Innovative approaches are not only accelerating early-stage discovery but also enabling the development of novel, cutting-edge therapeutic modalities that are approaching market readiness. Targets previously considered "undruggable" are now within reach, thanks to transformative techniques such as PROTACs, molecular glues, protein-protein interaction (PPI) antagonists, and advancements in modified peptides and nucleotides. A crucial step in medicinal chemistry is hypothesis generation, where the structural specifics of a target are analyzed to identify potential small molecules that can bind and modulate its activity. To support this process, a cheat-sheet-style lecture on intermolecular interactions will serve as the foundation for a hands-on crash course in hypothesis creation for small-molecule target interactions. The symposium will also feature short student presentations on drug discovery topics, as well as insight lectures to provide a deeper understanding of the evolving landscape of therapeutic innovation.
Kick-off Meeting
The kick-off meeting’s primary goal was to introduce the ACCELERATOR project activities in a number of steps targeting different interest groups. The whole event started off with a Ceremonial Opening introducing the project objectives to an audience composed of scientists from the CATRIN research institute. A significant proportion of the audience was created by Palacký University representatives, representatives of the regional government, and potential industrial partners from pharmaceutical companies.
The meeting was opened with a short speech made by the General Director of CATRIN, Pavel Banáš. Pavel Banáš introduced Alexander Dömling to the audience, alongside describing the expected benefits this collaboration should bring during the course of the five-year implementation and accenting the interdisciplinarity of the ERA Chair grant. One of the missions of the ACCELERATOR project is to interconnect the three CATRIN’s divisions (RCPTM, CRH, IMTM). Prof. Dömling continued to provide more details about his research history, also outlining the major goals of his project. The other CATRIN major representatives that followed up on Prof. Dömling’s talk were Prof. Radek Zbořil (CATRIN-RCPTM), the Founding Director of RCPTM, who explained the ACCELERATOR’s interconnections with nanotechnologies. Marián Hajdúch from CATRIN-IMTM introduced the project collaboration from the perspective of biomedicine and Lukáš Spíchal (CATRIN-CRH), one of the most prominent CRH’s researchers, explained the project goals from the standpoint of biotechnologies.
The programme continued with a tour of the RCPTM and CRH laboratories. This part of the programme was aimed at participants who had never been introduced to CATRIN’s research before. The tour was guided by Prof. Zbořil and dr. Spíchal. The audience were taken to different labs and were explained to how the ACCELERATOR research will be implemented in general and what each part of the CATRIN Institute will do in relation to the project.
In the afternoon, the programme continued with a presentation by the Project Adviser, the European Commission. This presentation was aimed at CATRIN’s management/administration staff members that will be either directly or indirectly responsible for implementing the project, in compliance with the set rules, as well as at the particular researchers participating in the project activities.
The last part of the programme was dedicated to scientific talks addressing the future research in detail.
This part was aimed at researchers from the participating CATRIN divisions. Alexander Dömling introduced the concept of Innovative Chemistry in greater detail, targeting colleagues he will be mostly collaborating with. Marián Hajdúch took a close look at biomedicine and the interconnection with the ACCELERATOR project. Lukáš Spíchal summarized the major goal as an expert in biotechnologies. Radek Zbořil explained into detail how this project will be implemented from the perspective of nanotechnologies. Pavel Banáš provided overview of the project Work Packages, Milestones and Deliverables, also setting internal deadlines for meeting all the specified requirements.
