Let’s summarize the year 2019 in The Parc. An outstanding track record was achieved in 2019: 29 PhD. students included in the program, 16 publications in impacted journals, 1 patent application, 30 international conference presentations, 6 plenary and keynote lectures, 8 research grants obtained and 4 students finalized their studies.
At the start of 2020, 29 students were enrolled in The Parc Program. Two students interrupted the program due to a long-term internship (Japan) and maternity leave. The number of students enrolled in each year is shown in Figure. Four students finished The Parc program and will have to defend their PhD. It was our pleasure to welcome two of them in Zentiva teams as Martin and Vítek decided to join the API department and the Preformulation and Biopharmacy department, respectively. Robert Lehocký accepted a position in Chemo in Spain and Marek Šoltys stayed at university (UCT). David Smrčka who finished The Parc program in 2018 successfully defended his thesis in 2019. David works in the Preformulation and Biopharmacy department in Zentiva and also has become a supervisor in The Parc.
The students were supervised by 20 experts from Zentiva and 11 academicians from various universities. The number of supervisors from individual universities was as follows: 5 academicians were from UCT, 2 from Faculty of Science and 1 academician from each of these universities: First Faculty of Medicine, Pharmaceutical Faculty of Charles university, Technical University in Liberec, and University of Pardubice.
The Parc students were authors or co-authors of 16 scientific publications, mostly in Q1 journals. One patent application was filed. The students had 30 contributions (posters and oral presentations) and 6 plenary/keynote lectures at international conferences. Some of them received the following awards: Matěj Novák got the first price at the 2nd Summer School on Oral Dosage Forms in Helsinki, Finland; Jiří Kolář was the winner and Jan Tomas placed second at the 9th International Granulation Workshop in Lausanne, Switzerland and Jakub Mužík came in the first place at CHISA 2019 conference. Two students were awarded the following Parc prizes 2019: Denisa Lizoňová was the winner of the Student Choice Award 2019 and Vojtěch Klimša won the Expert Choice Award 2019.
The students were supported by ORBIS grant to gain experience at universities in pharma sciences – several secondments took place. Matěj Novák and Jiří Kolář visited University of Helsinki, Argyro Chatziadi was on an internship at Trinity College in Dublin and Jan Tomas, Jakub Dvořák and Jana Romanová completed an internship at Poznan University of Medical Sciences in Poland. Michaela Gajdošová gained new knowledge and experience in transdermal delivery field during her three months long internship at Rutgers University, USA.
The Parc students presented the results regularly at The Parc symposia which were held in Technopark Kralupy, UCT (03/2019); at First Faculty of Medicine, Charles University (06/2019) and at IOCB (10/2019). The students have opportunity to develop not only theirs practical knowledge but also to improve theirs soft skills. Several workshops with Štěpán Galbavý, who is a respected soft skill coach in the Czech Republic, were organized during 2019. Topics including the quality of dual supervision of students and what is good in The Parc and what could be improved were discussed.
An amazing success was achieved as The Parc representatives received eight research grants from GACR (Czech Science Foundation), TACR (Technology Agency of the Czech Republic) and IGA (Internal Grant Agency of UCT) in total sum of 3.400 k EUR.
Zentiva company also financially supported The Parc in 2019.
As for further funding, government sources were approached. The subsequent appointments occurred with government representatives: Czech Parliament (06/19), Minister of Trade and Industry (08/19), Czechinvest (09/19) and IPR Praha (Prague Institute of Planning and Development, 10/19).
June 6. 2020