On the 7th and 8th February 2024, 29th annual Doctoral Students' Seminar Inorganic non-metallic materials took place.

Many doctoral students from UCT Prague and other Czech and Slovak universities were in attendance. Participants had the opportunity to see 20 different scientific presentations and our committee then chose 5 best ones to be awarded.

• 1st place - Ing. Petra Šimonová (UCT Prague) - Microwave sintered SnO₂-ZnO based ceramics
• 2nd place - Ing. Jan Zich (University of Pardubice) - Synthesis traps of polycrystalline Bi₂O₂Se
• 3rd place - Naser Hosseini MSc. (Slovak Academy of Sciences) - Joining of SiC-based Ceramics to Themselves for Extreme Environments Applications
• 4th place - Ing. Kateřina Křehlíková (UCT Prague) - Ternary cesium lithium iodide crystals grown by vertical Bridgman method for scintillation applications
• 5th place - Guido de la Torre, MSc. (Slovak Academy of Sciences) - Heated and plasma treated silicon nitride with different sintering additives for biomedical
  application

Additional award from the Czech Ceramic Society was given to Ing. Klára Pulcová (UCT Prague) for her  lecture Shrinkage and expansion of hydraulic binder from Metakaolin, Ca_SO₄ AII and Ca(OH)₂

_{Photos from the conference and the Book of abstract can be found HERE.}

A new book about historical glass, Regional Glass Production and Imports in Central Europe in the 13th–18th Centuries, Part II: Chrudim, was just published. Our colleagues contributed greatly to the publication.

Mediaeval archaeology has discovered large assemblages of mediaeval glass that have changed the assessment of the role of this commodity in the mediaeval household. Findings from seven houseplots of the historic core of town of Chrudim from the 13th - 17th centuries were evaluated. They demonstrate that sophisticated ways of dining were common in bourgeois households. From the 16th century onwards, the originally domestic glass was supplemented with luxury items from abroad. The picture of everyday life is completed by testimony of kitchen and table ceramics, stove tiles and metal inventory, as well as the transformations of bourgeois houses and the yards behind them. Together with first volume, it compares the contemporary situation in Brno a Wroclaw. The published glass is the largest detailed set published so far from Czech Republic and illustrates the importance of Chrudim in the Middle Ages.

The book can be bought at https://eshop.upce.cz/publikace/9007820/regional-glass-production-and-imports-in-central-europe-in-the-13th--18th-centuries-part-ii-chrudim

Ing. Petra Šimonová represents UCT Prague at the American Ceramic Society conference

Ing. Petra Šimonová, a 4th-year PhD candidate at the Department of Glass and Ceramics, UCT Prague, was selected to represent our university in the PCSA (President’s Council of Student Advisors) of the American Ceramic Society. In this role, she had the opportunity to attend the Annual Business Meeting, held from October 4–6, 2024, in Pittsburgh, USA.

Following the meeting, she participated in the MS&T24 international conference, where she presented the results of her dissertation research. For her work, she was honored with the prestigious GEMS (Graduate Excellence in Materials Science Award).

This opportunity will raise awareness of our university on an international level.