The competition is open every autumn to first-year doctoral students from four Brno universities. From 120 to 150 entries, 50 projects are selected for the next round, from which the expert jury chooses 25 winners. This year sixteen doctoral students from Masaryk University and one doctoral student from CEITEC MU were successful, five awards went to Brno University of Technology and three to CEITEC BUT. The Brno Ph.D. Talent competition is sponsored by the city of Brno. This year, a total of CZK 9 million was distributed among doctoral students, which is CZK 750,000 more than in previous years. The award ceremony and the presentation of the prizes took place on 19 March in the Chamber Hall of the New Town Hall.
“The development of research and innovation is part of Brno´s strategy. That is why the city is investing CZK 100 million in science and research, which it sees as an investment in the future. Brno wants to take a leading role in the Czech Republic, and the Brno Ph.D. Talent competition is part of that,” said Anna Putnová, Brno City Council representative for innovation and cooperation with research organisations, during the ceremony. “It is you, the laureates, who will help to address the issues of health, quality of life and technological progress,” she added, wishing them continued enthusiasm, personal integrity, respect, but also faith in themselves and hope and love for their fellow human beings who support them in their scientific endeavours. Miloš Šifalda, Director of the JCMM, recalled that the number of laureates since the beginning of the competition has exceeded 300 and expressed his hope that they will find their research both their work and their pleasure.
Among the seventeen awardees from Masaryk University were doctoral students from the Faculty of Science, Faculty of Medicine and Faculty of Informatics, and from RECETOX and CEITEC. Their projects focus on oncology, immunology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, biochemistry, astrophysics, environmental protection and computer science.
Renata Bartošová, a PhD student at the Faculty of Medicine who has been interested in biology since childhood, is focusing her research on ovarian cancer. “After coming to Masaryk University, I became more and more interested in immunology. During my undergraduate studies I was very interested in cancer and found the treatment options fascinating. Immunology eventually led me to join a research group at the Masaryk Memorial Cancer Institute, where I work on cancer biology,” she explained. “Our research has implications for clinical practice, and we hope to help improve the effectiveness of treatment for ovarian cancer patients, which is currently far from ideal,” added Renata Bartošová. In the future, this research could make it possible to identify patients who are suitable candidates for immunotherapy without exposing their bodies to less suitable treatments.
On the other hand, Kristýna Kuklová, a PhD student from the Faculty of Science, came to her field – paleoparasitology – more or less by accident. At the age of seventeen, while looking for a part-time job, she found herself at a cemetery excavation. “I was interested in the fate of the people buried there, so I decided to study anthropology. In my first semester, we received an email asking if my classmates and I wanted to do a project on paleoparasitology. Two of us signed up and I was so fascinated by the field that I chose it for my Bachelor ´s thesis. It offers a combination of everything – archaeology, anthropology and parasitology – a combination of three fields that are very close to my heart. Fate decided this for me,” explained Kristýna Kuklová. She is now involved in a project looking at ancient parasites to identify factors that have changed. “Our research could be used to develop vaccines to prevent future epidemics by targeting specific areas of increased virulence,” she added.
The doctoral students see the financial grant not only as a potential source of support for their studies, which will make it easier for them to concentrate on research without the need to earn extra income, but also as an opportunity to cover their expenses during foreign conferences, internships and travel. However, some of them do not hesitate to invest the money in further research.
“We definitely want to use the money in the lab because there are parts of our research that are currently unfunded. Thanks to the grant, we will not be financially constrained in our research, and it will save us money. And I think that this money should go back into science,” concluded the recent Brno Ph.D. Talent winner Kristýna Kuklová.
Recipients of the Brno Ph.D. Talent 2024/2025
Jakub Balabán, Faculty of Informatics:
Computer Science – Twin-width: Parameterized Algorithms and Structural Properties
The aim of the project is to study twin-width, which is a relatively new graph parameter. There is an algorithm that efficiently evaluates any first-order formula on graphs with small twin-width. However, this algorithm requires a certificate of small twin-width to be provided along with the input graph. Hence, the main goal of the project is to design algorithms that can compute these certificates.
Renata Bartošová, Faculty of Medicine:
Oncology and Hematology – Who will benefit from immunotherapy? The effect of Endoplasmic Reticulum stress on immune surveillance in carcinogenesis
This project aims to elucidate the role of endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) in immune surveillance in ovarian cancer (OC). Immunotherapy has great potential in the treatment of OC, but current immunotherapeutic approaches are failing. Current evidence suggests that ERS modulation may enhance immune function and improve the efficacy of immunotherapy in OC.
Josef Bryja, Faculty of Science:
Animal Physiology, Immunology and Developmental Biology – A model of Robinow syndrome in zebrafish: Association of wnt5a skin fibroblasts with skeletal malformations
The project focuses on the dermal fibroblast population and their interactions with skeletal stem cells. Although dermal fibroblasts are not specifically skeletogenic, they play a crucial role in supporting skeletal formation. This research provides an analysis of how changes in Wnt5a signaling using the Danio rerio model may contribute to diseases such as Robinow syndrome by disrupting this pathway.
Marianna Dafčíková, Faculty of Science:
Physics – Astrophysics – Gamma-ray research using miniature satellites
The project aims to see how the smallest satellites can contribute to studying the most energetic explosions in our universe.
Areej Fatima, Faculty of Science:
Plasma Physics – Bio-Inspired Spider-Like Nanofibers for Enhanced Photocatalytic Removal of Micropollutants from Wastewater
The project focuses on the development of a g-C3N4-based fabric that mimics a spider web structure for visible light photocatalysis in wastewater treatment. By utilizing plasma technology and optimizing the nanofiber composition, this fabric will offer a sustainable, high-performance solution for degrading micropollutants in real wastewater environments.
Sefa Furkan Demirci, Faculty of Medicine:
Neuroscience – GLP-1 receptor agonists as an innovative pharmacological intervention for substance use disorders
The project focuses on finding new safe and effective ways to treat drug addiction. It uses the operant auto-injection method, in which laboratory animals are trained to voluntarily take the drug, which is the best model to match the course of addiction in humans. The project also takes into account possible gender differences in addiction treatment, a neglected topic in this field.
Valentina Hrtoňová, Faculty of Medicine:
Neuroscience – Computational models for diagnosis and intervention techniques in drug-resistant epilepsy
Up to 40 percent of epileptics suffer from drug-resistant epilepsy, where standard treatments fail, and surgery is often the only hope for seizure freedom. Research is developing AI tools to enhance epilepsy surgery planning. The aim of the project is to locate seizure-causing regions using brain activity and scans to improve surgical precision and outcomes for these patients.
Jakub Hruška, CEITEC MU:
Life Sciences – Visualization of cellular dynamics of label-free nanoparticles using correlation microscopy
The project aims to better understand how living cells interact with micro- and nanoparticles (NPs) using a novel label-free approach. The processes will be studied via in-situ correlation probe and electron microscopy (CPEM) under the conditions of an environmental chamber in a scanning electron microscope (ESEM) that allows imaging of living unfixed cells. If applicable, a microfluidic device should ensure the delivery of NPs to the cells in-situ, i.e. without removing the sample from the chamber.
Viktor Kostohryz, Faculty of Medicine:
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology – Non-viral episomal vectors for efficient and safe generation of CAR-T cells
CAR-T cell therapy is a recent advancement in the area of oncology. It allows for reliable treatment of leukaemias. Cells in this therapy are genetically engineered to aim at specific cancerous cells and selectively destroy them. This treatment has recently been associated with a rare secondary leukaemia that is derived directly from CAR-T cells, limiting the possible wider use of this effective treatment. The project aims to make CAR-T cells safer by using non-viral episomal vectors.
Zuzana Krátka, Faculty of Science:
Animal Physiology, Immunology and Developmental Biology – Matrix metalloproteinase 9: a critical regulator of disease severity in tick-borne encephalitis
Tick-borne encephalitis can lead to severe neurological symptoms related to the disruption of the blood-brain barrier and the entry of the virus into the brain. Patient sera contain elevated levels of MMP-9, which affect the integrity of the blood-brain barrier. The project intends to be the first to use in vivo models to investigate MMP-9 as a key factor in the pathogenesis of the virus with the aim of developing antiviral therapies.
Kristýna Kuklová, Faculty of Science:
Ecological and Evolutionary Biology – Paleoparasitology.
The project focuses on developing advanced metagenomic tools to analyze environmental ancient DNA (aDNA) for precise identification of ancient parasites. By studying soil sediments, we aim to trace the origins and evolution of infectious diseases, offering valuable insights into the health of past human populations. The results will not only enhance our understanding of parasite epidemiology but also contribute to preventing future outbreaks and improving strategies for infection control.
Martin Kurečka, Faculty of Informatics:
Fundamentals of Computer Science – Safe and reliable reinforcement learning using constraints and learned models
The project focuses on Reinforcement Learning (RL), a method for training autonomous agents such as cars and robots. Although RL has found successful applications in fields such as robotics and finance, the reliability of trained agents remains a key issue. The project has three main goals: to improve the ways in which problems can be modeled as RL tasks, to formally verify the long-term "intentions" of agents, and to develop new monitoring techniques for detecting deviations from these intentions at runtime.
Milinda Lahiri, Faculty of Science, CEITEC MU:
Life Sciences – Regulation of stress granules in plant response to abiotic stress
In the context of climate change, the project aims to study stress factors in plants exposed to heat stress and use this knowledge to generate crops that are resistant to this stress.
Johana Mayer, Faculty of Medicine:
Oncology and Hematology – Comprehensive analysis of functional high-risk multiple myeloma
Multiple myeloma is an extremely heterogeneous disease, and despite advances in therapeutic options that have led to increased median survival times, there is still a group of so-called functional high-risk (FHR) patients who are not identified by standard diagnostics and have shorter survival times than other groups. The aim of this project is to comprehensively analyse the FHR phenotype in order to describe causal aberrations for easier and targeted identification of FHR patients.
Petra Pavelková, Faculty of Medicine:
Oncology and Hematology – Transcription factor FoxO1 in aggressiveness and therapeutic resistance of lymphoproliferative tumors
The project focuses on studying the role of the transcription factor FoxO1 in regulation the signaling pathway of the B-cell receptor (BCR) in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). The potential impact of FoxO1 activity on the expression of certain BCR signalosome components and the surface receptor itself could be linked to the development of CLL cell adaptation to therapeutics, as well as to the severity of the disease. This makes FoxO1 an intriguing potential target for combination therapy.
Martin Sitte, Faculty of Science, RECETOX:
Environmental and Health Sciences – Exploring the light apparatus of luminous marine pens
On Earth, and especially in the oceans, there is a huge number of organisms that emit light through a process called bioluminescence. The project focuses on characterising a previously unexplored light-emitting system in the sea pen Pennatula phosphorea. Uncovering the process has enormous potential for the development of next-generation bioluminescent tools and even engineering of decorative bioluminescent plants for lighting without electricity.
Michaela Vykypělová, Faculty of Science, RECETOX:
Environmental Sciences and Health – An Innovative Multidisciplinary Approach to Evaluating the Health Consequences of Bisphenol A Substitutions
Bisphenols are chemicals found in everyday plastic products. Research is looking at the effect of these substances on two interconnected systems that are essential to the health of the body: the immune system and the gut microbiome. In addition to understanding the health risks associated with bisphenols, the aim is to develop a methodology for studying the effects of chemicals on the gut microbiome-immune system, and thus contribute to the development and use of safer and healthier materials.