Periodic Table of Charles University

The installation. Cippo87 (Atlas Obscura User)

In early 2019, the chemistry department at Charles University in Prague installed an excellent interactive periodic table. It’s a large display case holding various real samples of the elements in the chart. Each case is individually illuminated and connected to an interactive screen, which displays information about the elements and lights up the cases in different colors accordingly to their properties.

The chemistry department resides in a Neo-Renaissance building built between 1903 and 1905. The architects were August Kožíšek and Bohumil Novotný.

The construction was headed by Prof. Bohumil Brauner (1855 to 1935), who later became the first director of the Chemical Institute. He collaborated with D. I. Mendeleev (1834 to 1907) and contributed to the promotion and improvement of his periodic table of elements. As an assistant and then a professor of physical chemistry, Jaroslav Hejrovský (1890 to 1967) worked as a researcher and founder of polarography. In 1959, he received the Nobel Prize for the discovery and development of the analytical polarographic method.

Know Before You Go

The chemistry department is open during business hours. The software is in Czech only, but it should be easy enough to use it anyway. Once inside the building you can also have a look at the displays in the corridors, which contain various minerals, old scientific instruments, and other interesting artifacts. There is also a bar at floor - 1 (basement level).