Lenda Scholarship recipient chose medicine during his military service
The scholarship intended for Norwegian students was awarded to Markus Strand Pilskog from Ålesund. He is its third recipient.
CZECRIN is a national clinical research infrastructure network, connecting workplaces where academic clinical research takes place, and is coordinated by Masaryk University and the International Clinical Research Centre at the St. Anne’s University Hospital in Brno.
The European Union Framework Programme for Research and Innovation for 2014-2020 - Horizon 2020 (H2020) - sets the framework for EU support of research and innovation activities. It consists of 7 priorities, one of which is Excellent Science. It is this pillar of H2020 projects that financially supports projects in which the CZECRIN infrastructure, among others, participates. Involvement in projects funded under Horizon 2020 is a key indicator of success and international recognition of high expertise.
Within the H2020 projects, CZECRIN ranked first in the final evaluation of the number of participants within the involvement in the European Research Infrastructure Consortia (ERIC), as the Czech national branch of ECRIN-ERIC. In addition, ECRIN-ERIC demonstrated the highest involvement among the ERICs participating in H2020 projects, with involvement in 47 projects, of which 16 projects involved Czech entities. These entities were involved in the 16 mentioned H2020 projects with a total of 24 participations. "This means that the Czech entity participated in almost 35% of the projects that ECRIN-ERIC acquired. ECRIN-ERIC has also proved its social utility by participating in European joint programs, in the case of Czech participation, it was specifically the project of the European Joint Programme for Rare Diseases (co-financed by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports). This is a very good result for both the European and national levels of ECRIN-ERIC/CZECRIN management,” the Technology Centre CAS states in its article (the article is available only in the Czech language). BBMRI is in second place in the number of participants.
The scholarship intended for Norwegian students was awarded to Markus Strand Pilskog from Ålesund. He is its third recipient.
“We have proven that the results of our research groups have a direct impact on practice and on the lives of our patients,” said Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Masaryk University, Jaroslav Štěrba, at the EXCELES program’s review conference held in the residence of the Mayor of the City of Prague on 2 December 2025. The event brought together key biomedical institutions from across the country. It highlighted the unique contribution of the national projects financed by the National Recovery Plan—primarily fostering collaboration instead of the previous fragmentation—to clinical practice and public health.