Zdenek Weiss heads the Laboratory of Emission Spectroscopy at the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague. He studied physics at the Charles University, Prague, and received his CSc. (PhD) degree in plasma physics from the Inst. of Plasma Physics CSAV, in 1992. He started his career as a research fellow in the Surface analysis group in a R&D facility of the SKODA concern, Pilsen, and in 1992 he joined LECO Gilching GmbH., Germany, as Applications specialist for Glow discharge optical emission spectroscopy (GD-OES). In 1994-1997 he worked at the same position at LECO Corp., St. Joseph, MI, USA, and since 1998 he was in charge of analytical applications for LECO subsidiaries in Europe and headed the LECO European Applications Centre in Prague. In 2017 he joined the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague, and heads the Laboratory of Emission Spectroscopy there. His research is focused on glow discharge spectroscopy and its fundamentals, including excitation mechanisms in the glow discharge plasma and analytical applications of GD-OES. He published 78 papers in peer-reviewed journals, with more than 1150 citations, and is a member of the Steering Committee of the European working group for glow discharge spectroscopy (EW-GDS).