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/ Events

New frontiers in science diplomacy

01 - 02 June 2009 09:00 - 17:00

Organised by

  • Professor Lorna Casselton FRS (Royal Society)
  • Professor Mohamed Hassan (Academy of Sciences for the Developing World)
  • Dr Raghunath Mashelkar FRS (National Chemical Laboratory)
  • Dr Jim McQuaid FREng (University of Sheffield)
  • Dr Vaughan Turekian (American Association for the Advancement of Science)
  • Professor Anthony Cheetham FRS (University of Cambridge)

This meeting is in collaboration with AAAS.

Synopsis

By bringing together experts from the UK and international scientific and foreign policy communities, this two-day meeting will examine the role of science as a source of soft power in foreign policy. The first day will discuss various international perspectives on the meaning, value and tools of science diplomacy, as well as identifying barriers to science diplomacy and how they may be overcome. The second day will then examine the role of science in achieving two key foreign policy goals: maintaining international peace and security, and promoting economic and social development and well-being.

The meeting will have the following sessions: Current and future directions for science diplomacy, Perspectives on science diplomacy, New partnerships with the Islamic-World, The role of Science in Nuclear Diplomacy, Environmental security: poles apart?, Science for development, Building capacity for science diplomacy, New frontiers in science diplomacy.

Organisers

  • Professor Lorna Casselton FRS

  • Professor Mohamed Hassan, Academy of Sciences for the Developing World

    Hassan is executive director of the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS), President of the African Academy of Sciences (AAS) and Chairman of the Honorary Presidential Advisory Council for S&T in Nigeria. After obtaining his DPhil at the University of Oxford in 1973, he returned to Sudan as Professor and Dean of the School of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Khartoum. Since 1986, he has been working in Trieste, first as Executive Secretary and then as Executive Director of TWAS. Since 2001, Hassan also serves as executive director of the Secretariat of the InterAcademy Panel on International Issues (IAP). He received the Comendator (1996), Grand Cross (2005), and National Order of Scientific Merit, Brazil; and Officer, Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, 2003. His membership includes: Fellow, TWAS, 1985; founding fellow, AAS, 1985; fellow, Islamic World Academy of Sciences, 1992; honorary member, Academia Colombiana de Ciencias Exactas, Físicas y Naturales, 1996; corresponding member, Académie Royale des Sciences d'Outre-Mer, Belgium, 2001; and foreign fellow, Pakistan Academy of Sciences, 2002; honorary member, Palestine Academy of Science and Technology, 2005; and founding member, Academy of Sciences of Lebanon, 2006.Hassan's research interests include plasma physics and environmental modelling of air pollution and soil erosion in drylands. 

  • Dr Raghunath Mashelkar FRS, President, Global Research Alliance

    "Dr R.A. Mashelkar, CSIR Bhatnagar Fellow, is presently also the President of Global Research Alliance, a network of publicly funded R&D institutes from Asia-Pacific, Europe and USA with over 60,000 scientists.  He is also the Chairman of India's National Innovation Foundation. Dr Mashelkar served as the Director General of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), with thirty-eight laboratories and about 20,000 employees for over eleven years. He was also the President of Indian National Science Academy and President of Institution of Chemical Engineers (UK).

    Dr. Mashelkar is a Fellow of the Royal Society, Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Engineering, Fellow of the UK Royal Academy of Engineering, Fellow of the US World Academy of Art & Science, Fellow of Australian Technological Science & Engineering Academy and Fellow of The Academy of Sciences for the Developing World. Twenty-seven universities have honoured him with honorary doctorates, which include Universities of London, Salford, Pretoria, Wisconsin and Delhi.

    In the post-liberalised India, Dr. Mashelkar has been a key architect of India's science, technology and innovation policies. The President of India honoured Dr. Mashelkar with Padmashri (1991) and with Padmabhushan (2000), which are two of the highest civilian honours in recognition of his contribution to nation building."

  • Dr Jim McQuaid FREng, University of Sheffield

    Dr Jim McQuaid graduated in Mechanical Engineering from University College Dublin and he has a PhD in Aeronautical Engineering from the University of Cambridge. He has an honorary DEng awarded by the University of Sheffield and is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. He was Director of Science and Technology and Chief Scientist of the Health and Safety Executive from which he retired in 1999. His research interests focused on large scale accidents in the coal mining and chemical industries and involved extensive collaboration in European Commission programmes and with safety institutions worldwide. He practices as a consulting engineer and has wide experience in the assessment and management of risks to industrial safety and the environment particularly from catastrophic events and in regulatory aspects of their control.

    Current and recent activities and memberships include:
    " Environmental Security Panel of the Science for Peace and Security programme of NATO's Public Diplomacy Division 2005-08 (Chairman 2008); continuing role as advisor on diverse R&D projects on environmental security.
    " UK member of the Board of Governors of the European Commission's Joint Research Centre 2001-2007.
    " Royal Society Standing Committee on Scientific Aspects of International Security, 2006-2008.
    " Health Protection Agency Advisory Group on Risk and Society 2006-2009.
    " British Columbia Hydropower Advisory Group on Dam Safety Assessment, 2000-present; project group on Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Characterisation, 2008-present.
    " Visiting Professor in mechanical engineering at the University of Sheffield (1997-present) and in engineering for sustainable development at the University of Ulster (2000-present).
    " Chairman of the Steering Group of the UK Deep Underground Laboratory researching the detection of dark matter and aspects of nuclear astrophysics, 2007-present. 

  • Dr Vaughan Turekian, American Association for the Advancement of Science

  • Professor Anthony Cheetham FRS, University of Cambridge, UK

    "Tony Cheetham obtained his DPhil at Oxford in 1971 and did post-doctoral work in the Materials Physics Division at Harwell. He joined the chemistry faculty at Oxford in 1974, and then moved to the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1991 to become Professor in the Materials Department. In 1992 he took up the Directorship of the new Materials Research Laboratory, which he led for the first 12 years of its existence. He became the Director of the new-created International Center for Materials Research at UCSB in 2004, and then moved to Cambridge in 2007 to become the Goldsmiths’ Professor of Materials Science. Cheetham is a Fellow of the Royal Society (1994), TWAS (1999), the German National Academy of Sciences (2011), and several other academies.

    Tony Cheetham has received numerous major awards for his work in the field of inorganic and materials chemistry; these include a Chaire Blaise Pascal, Paris, (1997-9), the Somiya Award of the IUMRS (with CNR Rao, 2004), the Leverhulme Medal of the Royal Society (2008), the Platinum Medal of the IOM3 (2011), the Nyholm Prize from the Royal Society of Chemistry (2012), and honorary doctorates from Versailles (2006), St. Andrews (2011), and Tumkur (2011).

    He became the Treasurer and Vice-President of the Royal Society at the end of November 2012."