The hero of our story, the Opal® variety, was bred at the Station for Breeding of Apple Trees for Disease Resistance in Střížovice in the Czech Paradise, which is one of the ÚEB’s workplaces. The variety is characterised by golden yellow, honey-sweet fruit with an excellent taste. Since 2005 it has been protected by a patent in the USA and a year later it obtained protection rights within the EU. In 2015 it even flew into space.

The development of hydrogels and their application in the form of Hemagel ® is undoubtedly one of the world achievements of the scientists from the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences. The discovery of a method for producing soft contact lenses from hydrogel brought Prof. Otto Wichterle, the founder of the Institute, worldwide recognition.

The transfer of a new compact method for the conversion of methane to methanol, developed by a team of scientists from the J. Heyrovsky Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences under the leadership of Jiří Dědeček, has a great chance of application in industry. At the first Transfera Technology Day 2020, linking science and business, the project made it to the finals and was judged third best. Scientists from the J. Heyrovsky Institute of Physical Chemistry of the CAS are working together with transfer engineers from the Centre for Technology Transfer of the CAS (CeTTAV) to find partners for industrial use. The method could, for example, make fuels cheaper.