Karolina Bodláková was awarded a silver medal in the worldwide competition of secondary school students in Chinese Beijing

A student of the Gymnasium Česká 64 in České Budějovice, Karolina Bodláková, who has worked in the laboratory of Dalibor Kodrík, Institute of Entomology BC CAS was awarded a silver medal in the worldwide competition of secondary school students in Chinese Beijing - The Beijing Youth Science Creation Competition - in March 2016. Karolina presented her poster under the title - Hormonal Control of Digestion in the American cockroach, Periplaneta americana: Contribution to Potential Usage of Adipokinetic Hormones as Biorationale Insecticides. The results characterize the role of adipokinetic hormones in insect digestion and describe a novel function of those hormones – direct stimulation of digestive enzyme activity. This topic is a part of the large project of Dalibor Kodrík which deals with potential usage of those hormones in combination with classical insecticides for a control of insect pest populations. The idea of the project comes from the main role of adipokinetic hormones in an insect body – stimulation of general metabolism: this results in increased turnover of all metabolites including toxins accompanied by their faster penetration into cells increasing their toxic activity.