13th

CONFERENCE LOCATIONS

Marianske Lazne

The traditional venue for the last few conferences - Marianske Lazne offered both conditions for fruitful professional discussions and an excellent social background. The second largest Czech spa is known to be the most beautiful city - garden in the Czech Republic. Located at the southern edge of a nature reservation "Slavkovsky les" in Western Bohemia, Marianske Lazne has been offering its hospitality and health power of some 100 wells to the public since 1818. The list of important visitors ranges from Edward VIIth, King of England, through composers (e.g. F. Chopin, R. Wagner, F. Liszt), writers (e.g. M. Twain, R. Kipling, N. V. Gogol), to A. Nobel and several Nobel Prize winners.

The city offers a broad range of cultural, social, and sports events – it is the seat of a symphonic orchestra, and its golf links are the oldest in the Czech Republic. Among the major attractions, a pseudo-baroque cast-iron colonnade with the "Singing Fountain" (musical and scenic illumination performances) can be listed.

Jachymov

Not many cities with a population of about 3,000 can boast to have been deeply involved in several milestones of the history of mankind. However, this was the case of Jachymov (Sankt Joachimsthal) where the silver Joachimsthal Thaler (Tolar) – the coin that gave the name to one of the most important currencies of today – the US Dollar – was born in the 1520s. In the 16th century, hundreds of thousands of these coins spread the name of the city world-wide. Another important period was that of uranium mining - starting with the world's oldest uranium mine operated on an industrial basis, up to the 1950s, when some 8,000 metric tons of pure metal were exported to the former Soviet Union.

The "modern age" for Jachymov was started thanks to radiochemistry. After the 1898 discoveries of Polonium and Radium, that were isolated from Jachymov Uranium Pigments Factory waste by Marie and Pierre Curie, the reason for the "unusualness" of the springs, found as early as in 1864, was discovered – their radioactivity. Since 1906 the first radioactive spa has been operated, with a current annual attendance greater than five times the number of permanent inhabitants.