News & Highlights

2023

January: Wahiba Berretima from Algeria joined our team for three months (see picture)

2022

September: Six members of our group attended the 33rd European Arachnological Congress in Greifswald (see picture) and Vladka Soltysova won a prize for the best poster (see picture); prof. Jennifer Apple from SUNY Geneseo, US, joined our team for a sabbatical until the end of the year (see picture)

August: Luis Fernández from Spain joined our team for three months (see picture); Sepid prepared a cornucopia of delicious Iranian meals (see picture)

July: Sepid prepared the first street food party (see picture)

April: Domagoj Gajski received a prize for the best talk at 6th PhD Student Symposium in Zabreg (Croatia) (see picture); Sepideh, Vladimira, Ondrej, and Stano went to Cyprus to investigate ant-eating spiders (see picture)

March: Domagoj Gajski, an awardee of Brno PhD talent, showed up a commercial for the prize (see link); Domagoj, Milan and Stano went to northern Portugal to investigate ant-eating spiders (see picture)

January: Our team was awarded a new project from the Czech Science Foundation and Stano eventually became MUNI scientist after 15 years (see picture)

2021
December: Prof. Vanhara was awarded a golden medal for his contribution to the faculty (see picture)

November: Ondrej Michalek gave a talk on his research at Science Party (see link); David and Stano finished their hunt for Zodarion rubidum in Tecuci (Romania) (see picture)

May: Adam Simunek, a secondary school student, won a district competition in SOC with a thesis on analysis of venom gland in a spider with coercive copulation (see link); Ondrej Michalek received a dean prize for excellent PhD thesis

April: The career of Ondrej Michalek is covered in the last issue of Magazin M (see link); Matej Pekar, a secondary school student, won a local competition in SOC with a thesis on development of image segmentation application used in our mimicry research (see link)

March: Tomislav Gojak from the University of Zagreb (Croatia) joined our team for a few months (see picture); Our team was on Czech TV news (see video); The programme of our group seminars for this semester (see link).

February: Ondrej Michalek was awarded the Marie Curie Fellowship for a stay at the University of Queensland, Australia.

2020
December: Updated second edition of Modern Analysis of Biological Data 1 is out (see webpage)

November: Our recent research on coercive mating in Thanatus spiders was covered by the New Scientist (see link).

July: Congratulations to Vladka Soltysova and Matej Ivan who successfuly defended a thesis and were awarded Bachelor and Master degree, respectively.

June: A new bachelor student, Lenka Baranovicova, joined our team and we made a collecting trip to Lednice park (see picture).

May: A new bachelor student, Jitka Mrozkova, joined our team and we made a collecting trip to Palava (see picture).

April: You can read an interview on our paper on how ant-mimicking Micaria selects its ant model in Myrmecological News Blog (see link).

March: Monica Pramatarova from University in Sofia (Bulgaria) joined our team for a few months (see picture)

January: Domagoj Gajski was awarded the PhD Talent grant (see news); arachnology course with participants from the University of Zagreb took place at the Masaryk University centre in Telc (see picture)

2019

November: Tamas Szuts from University of Veterinarian Medicine in Budapest visited our group and gave a talk on ant-like salticids (see picture).

September: Ondrej Michalek was awarded a prize for the best student talk at the 7th Conference of the Czech Society for Ecology (see picture)

July: Collaboration of our team with CEITEC group on spider venoms was covered in the Connect magazine (see link)

June: Martina Martišová received a dean prize for excellent PhD thesis (see document)

May: Marzio Cometa from Italy joined our team for a Master thesis (see picture)

April: Glenn King from Queensland University visited our lab and we made a trip to Lednice (see picture)

March: Andrea Parimuchova from Slovakia joined our team for a month (see picture); Ejgil Gravesen from Denmark visited our group; Domagoj Gajski from Croatia is back to our group

February: Lenka Sentenska was awarded the Marie Curie Fellowship; Domagoj Gajski defended his Master thesis at the University of Zagreb; and Martin Vasicek received a prize for the second best poster at the Zoologicke dny 2019 conference (see document)

January: Our team was awarded two new grant projects (see link)

2018

December: Eva Liznarova and Ondrej Michalek came up with the script and acted in a scene of the departmental drama showing the focus of our research (see picture)

November: Andrea Tothova wrote a commentary on women in science (see link); Ondrej Michalek was awarded a prize for the best student talk at the 45th Conference of the Czech and Slovak Ethological Society (see document)

October: Narmin Beydizade from Azerbaijan joined our team for a year (see picture); Agnieszka Józefowska from Poland joined our group for a month; Ondro’s photo made it to the cover of the latest issue of Journal of Animal Ecology (see link)

September: Marcelo Christian from Germany joined our lab for a month (see picture)

August: Our team discovered how Palpimanus spiders avoid cannibalism (see paper and media cover); and visited prof. Vanhara at his home (see picture)

July: Ondrej Michalek and Yun-Yun Tsai were awarded a prize for the best talk and poster, respectively, at the 31st European Congress of Arachnology (see document and picture)

June: Lenka Sentenska received a dean prize for excellent PhD thesis; Jana Hintenausova defended her MSc thesis (see picture); our team attended the 8th European Hemiptera Congress where Jana Hintenausova was awarded a prize for the best poster (see picture)

May: Eva Liznarova and Lenka Petrakova were awarded a prize for a popular article published in Ziva (see document and picture); Martina Martisova defended her PhD thesis

April: Alastair Gibbons from Great Britain and David Ortiz from US joined our team (see picture)

March: Luis Fernandez Garcia defended his PhD thesis at Universidad de la Republica in Uruguay (see picture); Domagoj Gajski from Croatia joined our team

February: Jan Raska was awarded a prize for the best talk at Zoologicke dny 2018 (see link)

January: Professor Jaromir Vanhara was appointed an Emeritus professor (see document)

2017

December: Radek Michalko defended his PhD thesis and our team participated at the Christmas fashion show (see picture)

November: Our team discovered a sense organ in the male palp of Philodromus spiders (see paper and media cover)

October: Within the Science Night our group prepared games for children and served delicious meals (see pictures)

September: Yun-Yun Tsai from Taiwan joined our team for a year (see picture)

August: Our team attended European Congress of Arachnology (see picture), where Jan Raska won a prize for a student talk (see picture)

July: New members joined our team (see picture)

June: Radek Michalko was awarded by rector for excellent PhD results (see document and webpage); Eva Liznarova (see document) received a dean prize for excellent PhD thesis

May: Lenka Sentenska defended her PhD thesis (see picture)

April: Our team described several new ant-mimicking spiders from Australia (see paper and video)

March: We found how the personality of spiders matters in the biocontrol of pests (see paper, video, and media cover)

February: Our team discovered a large mimetic complex of golden arthropods (see paper and video)

January: Our team was on Czech TV news (see video)