What Is FYKOS?

This page describes the FYKOS organization; information about the FYKOS physics correspondence competition can be found here.

FYKOS is a group under the patronage of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University in Prague (CUNI MFF) and the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic. FYKOS has a rich 36-year history of organizing educational events for high-school students in physics and related fields with the goal of inspiring and educating the participants.

The group consists mainly of students from CUNI MFF, but also of students from other universities and a few working professionals.

FYKOS is based and overseen by the Institute of Theoretical Physics of CUNI MFF, we also cooperate with the Institute of Particle and Nuclear Physics and the Department of Physics Education of the same faculty to ensure a high educational quality of our events.

FYKOS organizes many different educational events throughout the year.

The original activity of FYKOS is the physics correspondence competition (which is where the FYKOS group got its name – in Czech FYzikální KOrespondenční Seminář).

This competition has been happening since the very beginning of our group in 1987. The physics correspondence competition is focused mainly on improving the participants’ skills in physics through individual feedback, example solutions and advanced study texts rather than on the competitive aspect itself.

The best participants of FYKOS correspondence competition are invited for FYKOS camps, which take part twice a year and consist of a week-long program full of physics lectures and experiments, but also fun games throughout the day and night. These camps are currently only for Czech-speaking participants, but they might be extended to English-speaking participants as well in the future.

For the lovers of competitions, we annually organize two large international team physics competitions.

Fyziklani, is an in-person competition for high school students with a rich accompanying program full of lectures, excursions to scientific laboratories, but also networking program such as a banquet or a party, which allows the participants to meet other students from around the world (Fyziklani already reached over 1000 participants from more than 20 countries in the past years).

Physics Brawl Online, is an on-line version of Fyziklani, which also has an open category, in which anyone, not just high-school students, can take part. In Physics Brawl Online, you can enjoy the competition of and measure your skills against thousands of people from around the world each year.

FYKOS also organizes many more events throughout the year, however, they are mostly focused only on Czech-speaking students.

You can find more information about our events on our webpage in the „Events“ tab.

In 1987, a group of students led by Pavel Krtouš, supported by Dr. Leoš Dvořák from former Department of theoretical physics, organized the first year of Prague Correspondence Seminar from Physics, first physics' competition of its kind in Bohemia and Moravia. Since that time, hundreds of CUNI MFF students, mostly former participants, have been involved in organizing FYKOS. For more information, check our history.

In the beginning, there was only the physics correspondence competition. Later, FYKOS camps were added and other events were introduced as well – A Day of Experimental Physics, The Week of Applied Physics, Fyziklani, Physics Brawl Online, and others.