Michal Holčapek Winning the Czech Brains Award

Michal Holčapek, a researcher in Analytical Chemistry of the Faculty of Chemical Technology of the University of Pardubice has won the Czech Brains Jury’s Extraordinary Award for 2024. With the Czech Brain Award (Česká hlava) being the most prestigious research award in the Czech Republic, Michal Holčapek won the award for his research into lipids and discovery of a method that can diagnose the pancreatic cancer from blood analysis only.

The 2024 award ceremony was broadcast live by the Czech Television.

The Czech Brains Award is the most prestigious award available to researchers in the Czech Republic. The award has been been presented in several categories since 2002. Since 2007 the Czech Brains Initiative has organized a similar award for secondary-school students called Little Czech Brain (Česká hlavička). Last year, Ing. Barbora Kamenická, Ph.D., a graduate from the University of Pardubice, received the award in the Doctorandus category for technical sciences.

Professor Michal Holčapek has been researching lipid analysis for a long time with special focus on the detection of some cancer types. Pancreatic cancer is one of the most aggressive tumours with 80% of the cases being diagnosed too late for the therapy to be effective and thus a 5-year survival rate of less than 10%. For more than 20 years, Professor Holčapek’s team has focused on lipidomic analysis using mass spectroscopy combined with liquid or supercritical fluid chromatography, which enabled them to develop a number of validated analytical methods for detailed description of lipids in biological samples. Thanks to their research, it was possible to develop new screening methods to improve early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.

The method is based on lipidomic analysis of blood, which determines the concentrations of more than 150 lipids. Thanks to the data from patients with pancreatic cancer and healthy individuals, a statistical model is created that can determine whether the patient suffers from the cancer with a certainty of 95%. The blood test has a number of advantages: it only requires a blood sample and it is reliable to detect even early stages of cancer and thus diagnose the cancer even before the onset of the first symptoms. In addition, similar concentrations of lipids have been observed in other cancer types, showing potential of a universal test for more types of cancer.

Lipidica, a.s., a spin-off company founded by the University of Pardubice and FONS JK Group, a.s. is conducting the clinical trials in cooperation with Masaryk Oncological Institute in Brno, Olomouc University Hospital and another 13 hospitals across the Czech Republic. If the method is proved to be accurate and reliable in clinical testing, it can become a basis for national screening programme for those with high risk of pancreatic cancer, which would be unprecedented worldwide. In the long run, the team hopes to cover other types of cancer and implement a simple blood test into clinical practice, which would increase the chances of patients’ survival.

Other laureates of the Czech Brains Award in 2024

Czech Brains National government award

• Prof. Tomáš Jungwirth, Ph.D., Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences

INVENTION Award

• Mgr. Jan Dobeš, Ph.D., Charles University, Faculty of Science

INDUSTRIE Award

• Bene Meat Technologies a.s.

Doctorandus Award for technical sciences

• Ing. David Vojna, Ph.D., Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences

Doctorandus Award for natural sciences

• RNDr. Jakub Podgorný, Ph.D., Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences

LOREM Award

• prof. PharmDr. Petr Pávek, Ph.D., Charles University, Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové

Award of the Minister of the Environment

• doc. Mgr. Lukáš Trakal, Ph.D., Czech University of Life Sciences, Faculty of Environment