SCIENCE FAIR starts on Thursday!

Where to touch the periodic table of elements composed of real physical samples or taste test the most expensive and heaviest water? At the Science Fair! There, interested visitors can also sit down with lab pipettes, astronomical telescopes, weave through a laser maze, study turtles, pilot a fighter jet and much more.

"The Science Fair is meant to be interactive and fun, even though it covers very difficult and challenging topics," says Eva Zažímalová, chairwoman of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, the institution that has been organising the Science Fair since 2015. "We want to show that science is all around us, although we are not always aware of it. And what we have and can still have thanks to science and research."

Current challenges, paranormal and nature

Once again, interested parties will be able to get in touch with fauna and flora in several places - in the mobile laboratory of the Biological Centre of the CAS, at the stands of the Botanical Institute of the CAS or the Prague Zoo. The Research Institute of Forestry and Hunting will take those interested on a journey to the secrets of the forest and the Czech Society for the Protection of Bats will bring domesticated handicapped bats with them.

And what about the paranormal challenge at the science fair? Representatives of the Czech Sisyphus Skeptics Club will demonstrate some experiments that at first glance "prove" the existence of paranormal phenomena, but on closer examination will prove how well such experiments can be manipulated. They will also talk about common myths, misinformation or misleading alternative methods.

Like a red thread running through the fair are examples of how science is helping to answer the hard questions of our time, which do not have to be theoretical or "locked up" in a laboratory at all.

Lectures, debates and personal talks

The Science Fair also offers a unique opportunity to talk directly to experts. Whether at the stands, during debates or after lectures. In the Kepler Hall, for example, interested parties can sign up for the lectures Cities for Life? or Gods and Demons and the popular Ask a Scientist! Live, during which a panel of experts will answer the questions: how does the universe work? What about the immune system? How to arrange our living space efficiently so that the warmth of our home doesn't escape?

Visitors will have another opportunity to chat with experts and broaden their horizons on interesting topics at the Science Point, a hall built into the fair's entrance hall. Unlike the Kepler Hall, no reservation is required for this programme.

We're making it science!

The Science Fair involves not only the institutes of the CAS, which themselves cover a large part of the natural sciences, engineering, humanities and social sciences, but also universities, organisations and companies. The Charles University, the University of Science and Technology, the University of Ostrava will show the world of nanostructures or blue light, the Tomas Bata University in Zlín will present robotic systems and virtual reality. This year, the Slovak Academy of Sciences and the new Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice are participating again.

The range of exhibitions is also expanding every year.
"We are very pleased that thanks to more and more exhibitors we can show the sometimes unexpected forms that science and its results take. Not everyone immediately thinks of the role of research in the Sisyphus Skeptics Club or the Memory of the Nation project. Likewise, it may surprise someone that they can visit a nuclear reactor or peek into a hydrogen car at the Science Fair," says Petr Borovský from the Centre for Joint Activities of the CAS, which organises the fair.