News from magnetic group
The Bernard Bolzano Endowment Fund Prize was awarded to Michal Vališka on March 12, 2025, for his outstanding contributions in research of unconventional superconductor UTe₂. This recognition follows the publication of key findings in PNAS, Nature Communications, and other high-impact journals, which resulted from a fruitful collaboration between our department and the University of Cambridge. The award was presented by doc. Mirko Rokyta, Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics.
On Monday 27th January 2025, our PhD student Daniel Staško successfully defended his doctoral thesis, completing his study cascade at our department and faculty. His research path began in 2017 within the student faculty project and was followed by his bachelor thesis and his master work. In 2020, Daniel, together with his supervisor Milan Klicpera, delved into the study of frustrated pyrochlore oxides. This research culminated in the successful defence of his doctoral thesis "Crystallographic and electronic properties of rare-earth A2B2O7 oxides under extreme conditions".
Our recent paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), titled “Superconducting critical temperature elevated by intense magnetic fields,” explores how intense magnetic fields influence superconductivity in unconventional systems, shedding new light on the physics of superconductors.
Our department isn’t focused solely on basic research – we’re also dedicated to advanced automation that pushes the boundaries of science. The Charles Automata team has prepared an original Christmas video for you, in which a robot precisely arranges hundreds of crystals into the shape of a Christmas tree, all set to a melody inspired by Jingle Bells.
Our department in collaboration with Technical University of Munich organized the third edition of the Czech-Bavarian Mini-School on large research infrastructures and open data. Students acquired skills ranging from crystal growth to advanced neutron techniques and learned how to analyze data in accordance with F.A.I.R. principles.
Work of our valuable student and colleague Petr Král was awarded by the Charles University Grant Agency (GAUK) Board. His project “Pressure-driven structural and magnetic transformations in 221 intermetallics“ was evaluated as “Exceptionally good“ and moreover obtained a Honorable mention after his work has been evaluated as the third best solved project among the GAUK projects completed in 2023. The GAUK award was given to him within the festive ceremony on November 17 in Karolinum.
Our recent paper published in PNAS reveals a significantly revised high magnetic field superconducting phase diagram in the ultraclean limit of UTe2 single crystals. The study demonstrates a pronounced sensitivity of field-induced superconductivity to the presence of crystalline disorder.
Ondřej Michal, our Mgr. student, was awarded the Best Poster Award at the 22nd International Conference on Magnetism in Bologna for his poster titled "Magnetism and anisotropy of vdW antiferromagnet VCl3".
Our Ph.D. student Dávid Hovančík was awarded the Milan Odehnal Prize (2nd place) for his contribution to the investigating two-dimensional orbital magnetism in van der Waals systems. Dávid succeeded in the competition with his work published in Nano Letters, J. Phys. Chem. Letters, and Phys. Rev. B. Honorable Mention was in addition given to our another colleague, Petr Král for his study of magnetism and structure in frustrated tetragonal intermetallics with application of pressure.
The annual Scientific Members Meeting of the Institute Laue-Langevin (ILL; Grenoble, France) was organized at the Burg Obbendorf in a close proximity of the Jülich Forschungzentrum, Germany. Czech Republic was represented by our colleague Milan Klicpera.
