Czech and Slovak Crystallographic Association

 

President:                                                               Secretary :

RNDr. Jindřich Hašek, DrSc                                    Doc. RNDr. Radomir Kužel, CSc.

Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry                   Charles University

Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic          Faculty of Mathematics and Physics
162 00 Praha 6, Heyrovského nám. 2                     121 16 Praha 2, Ke Karlovu 5

Fax: (420)- 296 809 410                                         Fax: (420)-224911061

Tel.: (420)- 296 809 390                                        Tel.: (420)-221911394

E-mail : hasek@imc.cas.cz                                     E-mail: kuzel@karlov.mff.cuni.cz

 

 

Prof. Gautam Radhakrishna Desiraju

Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit,

Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, India

 

Praha, 15/9/2011

Dear Professor Desiraju,

 

Shortly after the 22nd General Assembly and Congress of the International Union of Crystallography in Madrid we have decided to submit a new bid for hosting the 25th General Assembly and Congress of the IUCr in Praha in 2020. The bid is submitted on behalf of the Regional Committee of IUCr and the Czech and Slovak Crystallographic Association. The initiative is supported by the main scientific bodies in the Czech Republic (Academy of Sciences, Charles University, Czech Technical University, Masaryk University, etc.). Preliminary support is promised by national and also by a number of local branches of international companies.

We have been considering organization of this congress since 1999 and we have already submitted our bids three times at three last congresses but always lost from different, mainly political and territorial reasons. We are convinced that these loses were not caused by bad quality of the bids. By contrast, we were told by many people including the members of the IUCr Executive committees that they were excellent. It seems that three attempts may be enough. However, we have never received such a large support as during the last congress in Madrid. Participants were coming to our booth and expressed their wishes that the congress should be organized in Prague. According to our information we also got significant support from many delegates of the Assembly. Finally, this was not sufficient since India also submitted a high-quality bid. Moreover the congress has never been to this part of the World and it definitely deserved it. Anyway, even after the voting many participants and delegates including some of them who supported Indian bid asked us to repeat the bid. Therefore, we also feel obliged to do so and we are submitting a new bid for 2020. We are convinced that Prague has all necessary conditions for successful congress and also that this city located in the heart of Europe is an ideal meeting point for all crystallographers of Europe and all over the World just for the 25th congress.

Prague - the capital of the Czech Republic with more than a million inhabitants - belongs to principal European cities with long history. Its original medieval monuments are attractive for visitors from any part of the world. It can be reached easily from all European countries by all the traffic means. It has an excellent public transportation system and well-developed infrastructure.

We would like to invite crystallographers to the modern and well-equipped Congress Center that already hosted several large congresses, the largest of which were NATO Summit in 2002 (8000 participants), Annual Meeting of International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group (17 000), and some world medical conferences. The center has five halls for 400 – 4000 people and up to 8 rooms with capacity ~ 100 people (http://www.kcp.cz/an/virtual-tours). The conference center is positioned in a walking distance from the city center and provides a direct view of the historical part of the city including the river and the Prague Castle.

Praha has an accommodation capacity of about hundred thousands visitors. Directly in the Congress Center, there are about 1200 double rooms. Another 2000 rooms of all categories are close the conference center (walking distance). Many other hotels and dormitories in all categories from 10 to 300 EUR per day are easily accessible via public transport in less than 30 minutes. Frequently running and comfortable metro ensures very fast transport from any part of Praha. 

The Czech and Slovak Crystallographic Association with nearly 400 members publishes it own crystallographic journal “Materials Structure” and organizes several conferences each year. It initialized a series of international conferences SIZE-STRAIN, organized the ECM-18 in 1998 with 1200 participants, it organized a series of protein crystallization courses. In 2004, it organized the European Powder Diffraction Conference (EPDIC) and the X-ray topography and high-resolution (XTOP) conference. During these meetings, we succeeded to put together an organizing team of enthusiastic colleagues and volunteers having now invaluable experience. Because of its size, the proposed Congress and General Assembly will be organized in close cooperation with the professional organization (PCO) with more than 10 years experience with large international conferences.

                It would be a great honor and pleasure for us, if Prague can host the Congress and General Assembly in 2020.

 

Sincerely yours,

                                                                                                                                

 

      Radomír Kužel                                                                                                  Jindřich Hašek

Chairman of the Regional Committee of IUCr                         President of the Czech and Slovak Crystallographic Association