Researchers’ Night 2023

Mysterious, elusive and convoluted? Let's experience this feeling together and let science reveal its greatest secrets. Explore, discover, and enjoy the knowledge. This year's topic is "Mystery". All physics departments present their program. The event is for children and adults.

6 Oct 2023 Tereza Schmidtová

Friday night, October 6th, 2023, belonged to the traditional event Researcher's Night!

Mystery. That was the topic of this year's Researcher's Night. Discover the secrets of physics, plasma and technologies based on them. The Department of Plasma Physics and Technology and CEPLANT have prepared varied programs for the general public. We traditionally contribute to this event every year.

This year's Night of Scientists attendance was record-breaking at the Faculty of Science and Masaryk University. The Kotlářská campus visited around 1 500 people. Animators from the staff and students prepared an exciting program that revealed the secrets of science and physics. In an entertaining and popularizing way, they addressed visitors of all ages. The event included puzzles, jigsaws, quizzes, and pairs games for the little ones. The event was a great success.

From the CEPLANT and Department of Plasma Physics and Technology, the Didactics of Physics illustrated electromagnetic waves' mystery. The Deposition of Thin Films and Nanostructures research group revealed the secrets of thin films and their preparation. Dr. Jana Jurmanova showed the secrets of microstructures using the Mira3 scanning electron microscope. The Plasma Nanotechnology and Bioapplication research group presented the mysterious effects of plasma and electric discharges. Look at the program and photo gallery to see what Scientists' Night at Physics looked like.

The mysterious effects of plasma

A plasma gun, a pencil or an arc... what do you imagine under these terms? For us, they are innovative plasma technologies for surface treatment of materials that you won't find anywhere else in the world. The plasma chemistry lab at the DPPT and CEPLANT is full of these devices. We use them every day to modify the surfaces of materials to match the properties we want.

Sometimes plasma opens up secrets that no one expects to be revealed. Can you find plasma anywhere in nature, you ask? Of course, you can! You can find plasma in the aurora borealis, lightning or the sun's corona.

Secrets of the thin layers' world

How thin is a thin layer? Where can it be found? What is it used for? How can it even be made?

Come and visit scientists from the Department of Plasma Physics and Technology and CEPLANT and discover the secrets of plasma and find out how it can be used to make thin films.

Mysterious microstructures

The electron microscope can unravel many mysteries from the world unseen to the naked eye, whether they concern living or non-living nature or the work of humans.

Join us to see the surfaces of seemingly ordinary objects and products from our laboratories! You will learn, for example, what burns nettles, why water doesn't stick to the underside of leaves, why a paper towel is sometimes incredibly strong, whether the gold layer on a drill bit is real gold, or how to tell an original Baroque painting from a more recent copy.

Detective Agency Electromagnetic Waves, Ltd.

Visible Light is just one member of a diverse team of electromagnetic detectives. They range in size from picometers to kilometers, and together they unravel the mysteries of the universe and the heart of matter. They can pass on their knowledge of the world to us. We just have to master the difficult language they sometimes speak, sometimes only whisper, or often only subtly hint. Come and meet these experts for yourself.

Behind the veil of mystery of plasma physics and technology

Do you like to compete? Don't forget your smartphone for Scientists' Night!

After a tour of the labs, you can put your knowledge to good use in a quiz for some nice prizes. The questions will cover what you will see with your own eyes: why electric discharges have different colors, how to cover even jagged objects with a thin layer of another material, how to change the wettability and non-wettability of surfaces, and how to image objects smaller than the wavelength of light.