21 May 2026, Student conference as a part of INTERMICRO project, IMIC, Prague

The conference for PhD students took place on Thursday, 21 May 2026 at the Institute of Microbiology in Prague. The overall topic was ‘Speaking with microbes’, with a focus on the INTER MICRO project (OP JAK). Dr Lucie Najmanová opened the conference with a short speech about the importance of the Sex/Gender dimension in research. The founders of the PhD club, Eliška Růžičková and Michaela Burešová, organised this event together with Janet Luthar, and with the help of other PhD club members, the conference went smoothly. The conference was divided into four sessions: Pathogens and Infectious Diseases; Antimicrobial Resistance and Therapeutics; Microbiome, Environment and Systems; and Protein Structure and Molecular Systems. During these sessions, we heard about interesting research projects conducted by PhD students from the IMIC laboratories, UCT and Charles University. During the conference, attendees could vote for their favourite presentation. First place went to Denisa Vondrová for her talk on deciphering the c-di-GMP-driven interactions of Bordetella with respiratory epithelia. Second place went to Elif Kaplan for her interesting talk on the impact of lifestyle transitions on bacteriophage-bacterium interactions in the gut microbiome. Third place went to our dear PhD student Mufarrah Mehboob for her talk on exploring the antibiotic-responsive regulatory function of ABCF proteins in antibiotic-producing bacteria. Congratulation to all!
The conference finished in the afternoon, with a BBQ prepared for all participants and other researchers. During the barbecue, various games were organised, such as petanque, archery, scientific bingo as way to networking and more. See more in the gallery.
Great thanks to all of the presenters and organisators!