13 September 2011
The Royal Society, the UK’s national academy of science, has announced the appointment of twenty-six new Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award holders. The scheme provides up to 5 years’ funding after which the award holder continues with a permanent post at the host university.
Jointly funded by the Wolfson Foundation and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), the scheme aims to provide universities with additional support to enable them to attract to this country or to retain respected scientists of outstanding achievement and potential. The focus of the award is a salary enhancement, usually in the range of £10,000 to £30,000 per annum.
The newly appointed award holders are working on a wide variety of projects including atmospheric aerosols, weather and climate; time and extra dimensions in space; early human evolution in Africa; and the impact of systemic infection and inflammation on the aged and diseased brain.
The Wolfson Foundation is a grant-making charity established in 1955. Funding is given to support excellence. More information is available from www.wolfson.org.uk.
The full list of Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award appointments is as follows:
| Professor Oreste Acuto | University of Oxford | Molecular mechanisms of TCR signalling determining T cell fates |
| Professor Jonathan Blundy | University of Bristol | Magmatic differentiation in the Earth's Crust |
| Professor Muffy Calder | University of Glasgow | Live formal models for predictable component-based systems |
| Professor Ken Carslaw | University of Leeds | Atmospheric Aerosols, Weather and Climate |
| Professor Neil Champness | University of Nottingham | Self-assembly of Photoactive Metal Organic Frameworks |
| Professor Jonathan Clayden | University of Manchester | Communication via Molecular Conformation |
| Professor David Cumming | University of Glasgow | Metamaterial sensor integration on to CMOS technology |
| Professor Alexander Davies | University of Leeds | Semiconductor and biological nanotechnology, and applications to healthcare |
| Professor Paddy Farrington | Open University | Statistical methods for pharmacoepidemiology and infectious disease epidemiology |
| Professor Jianfeng Feng | University of Warwick | Bridging the gap between fMRI and Genome-wide data with applications in diseases |
| Professor Ruth Gregory | University of Durham | Time and Extra Dimensions in Space |
| Professor Andrew Liddle | University of Sussex | Unveiling the dark Universe |
| Professor Mark Maslin | University College London | Investigating the causes of early Human Evolution in Africa |
| Professor Paul Milewski | University of Bath | Three-dimensional solitary waves: from wind ripples to waves on floating ice |
| Professor Carole Mundell | Liverpool John Moores University | Black Hole-Driven Explosions and the Dynamic Universe |
| Professor Tracy Palmer | University of Dundee | Probing the mechanism of protein export by the bacterial Tat transport system |
| Professor Richard Pancost | University of Bristol | The response of hydrological and biogeochemical cycles to past global warming |
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Professor Hugh Perry |
University of Southampton | The impact of systemic infection and inflammation on the aged and diseased brain |
| Professor Raphael Rouquier | University of Oxford | Higher categorical and homotopical methods in representation theory |
| Professor Debra Skene | University of Surrey | Linking light, circadian rhythms, sleep and metabolism in health and disease |
| Professor Maximilian Telford | University College London | Comparative genomics and the evolution of the Metazoa. |
| Professor Jonathan Tennyson | University College London | Molecular line lists for extra solar planet and other hot bodies |
| Professor David van Dyk | Imperial College London | Embedding Computer Models into Coherent Statistical Analyses in Astrophysics |
| Professor Fiona Watt | King's College London | Manipulating the stem cell niche at single cell resolution |
| Professor Howard Wilson | University of York | Stability and confinement in magnetised plasmas |
| Professor Andrew Zisserman | University of Oxford | Visual recognition of object categories in images and videos |