Executive Board

Officers

Catherine Bréchignac ICSU President (2008-2011) Science and Technology Ambassador for France Catherine Bréchignac, member of French national Académie des Sciences, and member of French national Académie des technologies, President of CNRS since January 2006, and President of "Palais de la Découverte” since 2004. After obtaining her PhD in 1977, she started a new field at the frontier of Atomic and Solid State Physics: the cluster physics as precursors of nano-objects. The study of nanoclusters ranging from a few atoms to several thousand atoms, which is a truly interdisciplinary study, provides a bridge between atomic and molecular and solid state physics.

Her scientific achievements gained her a coveted “Académie des Sciences” prize in 1991, the CNRS Silver Medal in 1994, James Frank lecturer, Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities in 2001, the Holweck Medal and prize from British and French Physical Societies in 2003, Doctor Honoris Causa of the “Freie Universität Berlin” in 2003, of “Georgia Tech Institute” (USA) in 2006, and of “Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne –EPFL” (Suisse) in 2007.

Catherine Bréchignac has been very influential in many ways in International Sciences and Science Policy: in France, as the founder of Cluster network (1991), as the Director of the Laboratoire Aimé Cotton (1989-1995), as the Scientific Director of the CNRS- Department of Physics and Mathematics (1995-1997), as the Director general of the CNRS (1997-2000), in Europe as chairperson of the European Union Research Organizations Head of Research Councils (1998-2000), President of “Institut d’Optique Graduate School” (2002-2006), and as member or chairperson of many committees such as Member of the Board of the European Physical Society (1989-1994), member of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) (1990-1994), as well as member of editorial board of several scientific journals.

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Yuan Tseh Lee President-Elect Yuan Tseh Lee was born on 19 November 1936 in the island of Taiwan. He received his B.S. degree from the National Taiwan University in 1959. After finishing his M.S. degree at Tsinghua University, he pursued his Ph.D. thesis research at the University of California at Berkeley under the guidance of the late B.H. Mahan. In 1965, after receiving his Ph.D. degree, he began to conduct reactive scattering experiments in ion-molecule reaction as a post-doctoral fellow in Mahan’s laboratory.

In 1967, Dr. Lee joined Dudley Herschbach’s group at Harvard as a research fellow where they took molecular beam experimentation beyond the alkali age. After being appointed assistant professor at the University of Chicago in 1968, he rapidly made his laboratory the North American capital of molecular beam study. Dr. Lee returned to Berkeley as a full professor in 1974 and significantly expanded his research to include, in addition to crossed molecular beams, studies of reaction dynamics, investigations of various primary photochemical processes, and the spectroscopy of ionic and molecular clusters.  In 1994, he retired from his position of University Professor and Principal Investigator for the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory at the University of California at Berkeley and assumed the position of the President of the Academy of Sciences located in Taipei, the highest ranking academic institution in Taiwan consisting of 30 independent institutes and 250 academicians. In subsequent years, he has transformed the Academy of Sciences into a world class research organization. In 2006 he became President Emeritus and Distinguished Research Fellow at the same institution.

Dr. Lee has received numerous awards and honors, including the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, the U.S. National Medal of Science, Faraday Medal and Prize from the Royal Chemical Society of Great Britain and the Jawaharlal Nehru Birth Centenary Medal from the Indian National Science Academy.  He has also been awarded the Ernest O. Lawrence Award of the U.S. Department of Energy, the Harrison Howe Award, the Peter Debye Award of Physical Chemistry from the American Chemical Society and the Othmer Gold Medal from the Chemical Heritage Foundation. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Science, a foreign member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, Göttingen Academy of Sciences, Indian Academy of Sciences, Korean Academy of Science and Technology, and Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, a member of the Academy of Sciences located in Taipei, the Third World Academy of Sciences, and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, an honorary member of the Japan Academy and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He has received Doctor Honoris Causa from thirty-five universities around the world.

Dr Lee will succeed the current ICSU President, Catherine Bréchignac, in October 2011.

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Goverdhan Mehta Past-President Bhatnagar Fellow and Honorary Professor, Department of Organic Chemistry, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India Professor Mehta PhD (Poona) and DSc (h.c.) is a leading researcher in the area of chemical Sciences and specializes in the area of organic chemistry. He is an author of over 400 research papers and has delivered over 200 lectures in major conferences around the world. He is on the Editorial Boards of over a dozen leading international journals in Chemical Sciences/Organic Chemistry and serves on the advisory boards of many R & D outfits and foundations worldwide.

Presently a CSIR-Bhatnagar Fellow, he has previously held positions as the Director of the Indian Institute of Science (1998-2005) and the President (Vice Chancellor) of the University of Hyderabad (1994-1998), two of India’s most prestigious academic institutions besides being Professor of Chemistry (1977-2005). He has been the President of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA, 1999-2001) and founding Co-Chair of the Inter Academy Council (IAC, 2001-2006). He is Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS), Foreign Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Fellow of TWAS and recipient of over 30 medals/awards and numerous Honorary Doctorate (D.Sc.) degrees. He has been awarded the civilian honor of ‘Padma Sri’ (2000) and ‘Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur’ 2004 by the Presidents of India and France, respectively. He is deeply interested in issues related to science and policy, science for sustainable development and is passionately committed to promoting and fostering international collaboration in S & T with the object of bridging the knowledge divide.

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In 1991-92 he was Visiting Professor at Washington University in St.Louis. He was elected Dean of the Faculty of Medicine in 1994 and served as Rector (Vice-Chancellor) of the University of Helsinki in 1996 - 2003. Thereafter he was appointed to a five-year term as Chancellor of the University of Helsinki, becoming Chancellor Emeritus in June 2008.

Chancellor Raivio´s main research topics have been purine metabolism, particularly catabolism of purine nucleotides and inborn errors of purine metabolism, physiology and molecular biology of xanthine oxidoreductase and its pathophysiological role in production of reactive oxygen metabolites, organ damage by oxygen metabolites and ontogenesis of antioxidant enzymes, and clinical studies on the care of newborn infants. He has been active in the international scene, acting as President of the European Association of Perinatal Medicine as well as of the European Society for Pediatric Research. He has extensive experience in medical publication, as European Chief Editor of Pediatric Research, Editor-in-Chief of the major Finnish medical journal Duodecim, and a member of the Editorial Board of several international journals.

Chancellor Raivio is Past President of the Finnish Academy of Sciences and Letters and the Delegation of Finnish Academies (ICSU National Member). He was a member of ICSU´s Committee for Scientific Planning and Review 2005-08, of the Scoping Group for the Human Health and Well-being project, and of the Reference Group for the SCOPE  review.

Chancellor Raivio´s experience in university affairs has been exploited in an advisory role by the governments of Sweden and Singapore, and the universities of Tokyo and Lund. He was Chair of the Board of Directors of the League of European Research Universities (LERU) in 2005-08.

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Reiko Kuroda Vice-President for External Relations Reiko Kuroda, a professor in the Department of Life Sciences, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo, is an eminent and active scientist with a broad scientific background. She has been investigating the chirality (left and right handedness) at different levels, from molecules to crystals in the non-biological domain, and from gene products to individual living organisms in the biological domains, with a view to linking these microscopic and macroscopic domains. Chirality is important as life is totally homochiral from the molecular standpoint.

She has discovered new features in the solid-state chemistry where chiral recognition is most strongly realized, and developed novel spectrophotometers to study chirality in the phase. Her laboratory has now become the world centre of solid-state chiroptical spectroscopy. Reiko Kuroda started her carrier as a physical chemist and then during the 11 years in the UK extended her specialty to include molecular biology and recently even to developmental biology. She has proved her talent in this field as well, and her discovery on chiral aspects at the early embryogenesis of snails now appears in a standard textbook used all over the world. Thus, she has a broad and deep understanding of sciences.

She is a member of the Science Council of Japan. She had and has several Japanese governmental positions, including a member of the Council of Science and Technology Policy (Cabinet Office), the Central Council of Education, Science and Culture, and the Japanese National Commission for UNESCO. She is recognized in the international academic communities as well, which can be judged from her involvement in IUCr (International Union of Crystallography) as a member of the local planning committee / an invited speaker (Osaka, 2008), and as a session organizer (Florence in 2005). She has been invited to join the International Advisory Committee for the 42nd IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, Glasgow in 2009). She was a vice-chair of the Council of Scientists, Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP, Strasbourg), is a board member of the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC, Cambridge UK), and one of the 27 Scientific Advisory Board members of the Molecular Frontiers (9 out of which are Nobel Prize laureates) which pushes the frontier of molecular sciences to save worldwide problems and encourage youngsters including those of developing countries to get interested in molecular sciences.

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Maurice Tchuente Secretary-General Maurice Tchuente is Pro-Chancellor of the University of Buea in Cameroon, Professor of computer science at the University de Yaounde I in Cameroon, and board chairman of the National Agency for Information and Communication Technologies. He is presently on leave as Directeur de Recherche at Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), France. He received his doctorat d’état es sciences mathématiques in 1982 at Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble. He was recruited as assistant associé at Université de Marseille Saint Charles in 1977.

From 1978 to 1984 he worked as attaché de recherche and later as chargé de recherché at CNRS, IMAG, Grenoble, In 1984 he was appointed professeur associé at Université Pierre Mendes France, Grenoble before going back to Cameroon, where he was appointed vice-rector of the university of Yaounde II in 1993, rector of the universities of Dschang (1996), Ngaoundere (1998) and Douala-(2000), and minister of higher education (2002- 2004). His research topics are parallel algorithms, dynamics of automata networks and epidemiological modelling. He is the co-author of more than 70 research papers in international journals or proceedings of international conferences, and author of a book entitled “Parallel Computation on Regular Arrays” published by Manchester University Press in 1993.

He is a founding member of CARI, an African Network for Research in Computer Science that organizes an international conference every two years since 1992, president of the scientific board of Institut Africain d’Informatique, Libreville, Gabon, member of the scientific boards of the United Nations University International Institute for Software Technology (UNU-IIST), and Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie. His research team is a component of the Unité Mixte Internatinale (UMI )named UMMISCO(Unité de Modélisation Mathématique et Informtique des Systèmes Complexes), currently being created by, IRD and Université de Paris 6. He is Chevalier de l’Ordre National de la Valeur (Cameroon), Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur (France), Commandeur de l’Ordre International des Palmes Académiques du Conseil Africain et Malgache de l’Enseignement Supérieur (CAMES), Bögouon, at the Chiefdom of Bayangam and Molla Ikome of the Buea Chiefdom in Cameroon. He is Member of the Academy of Sciences, Cameroon and Member of the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS). He has received the Boutros Boutros Ghali Award from the United Nations University in 1995 and was awarded the CNR Rao Prize for Scientific Research by TWAS in 2007.

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Hans Rudolf Ott Treasurer Hans Rudolf Ott was full professor of physics at ETH Zürich from 1986 to 2005. From 1988 until 1991 he was the founding head of the condensed matter division of the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) at Villigen, Switzerland, and he has chaired the international research committee of this institution from 1992 until the end of 2008. From 2001 until 2005 he was the chairman of the physics department of ETH Zürich.

Still leading a small research team at ETH Zürich, his research interests were and are focussed on properties of condensed matter at low temperatures, including superconductivity, electronic-, transport- and magnetic phenomena in highly correlated electron- and low-dimensional spin systems, phase transitions and properties of non-periodic solids.

He is ISI highly cited scientist. In 1989 he was awarded the Hewlett-Packard Europhysics Prize for Condensed Matter Physics and in 1990 he received the International Prize for New Materials of the American Physical Society. Between 1988 and 2007 he served terms as an editor for Physica C (Superconductivity), Review of Modern Physics and The European Physical Journal B. He is a honorary member of the Swiss Physical Society and the Physical Society of Zürich, a fellow of the American Physical Society and a Foreign Member of the Finnish Academy of Sciences. From 1997 to 2006 he was a member of the Research Council of the Swiss National Science Foundation and chaired its section for natural, mathematical and engineering sciences from 2004 to 2006. From 1999 until 2005 he was a member of the standing committee for physical and engineering sciences (PESC) of the European Science Foundation.

From 1997 until 2005 he was chairman of the Condensed Matter Division of the European Physical Society. Since 2007 he has been the chairman of the section for mathematics, astronomy and physics of the Swiss academy for natural sciences and since 2008 he is the president of the Albert Einstein Society Berne.

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Ordinary Members: from Scientific Unions

Dov Jaron IUPESM Dr. Jaron is Calhoun Distinguished Professor of Engineering in Medicine, School of Biomedical Engineering, Science and Health Systems at Drexel University in Philadelphia. He received his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 1967. He served as Director of Surgical Research at Maimonides Medical Ctr in NY (1967-1970) and Sinai Hospital of Detroit (1970-1972).

In 1972 he joined the University of Rhode Island and in 1980 moved to Drexel University as Professor and, until 1996, Director of the Biomedical Engineering and Science Institute. Beginning in 1992, on a 2-year leave, he served as Director of the Division of Biological and Critical Systems at the NSF.  From 1996 to 1998, also on leave, he served at the NIH as Associate Director for the National Ctr for Research Resources and Director of Biomedical Technology. He has held affiliated faculty appointments in numerous academic institutions.

Dr. Jaron’s research involves the integration of engineering techniques, mathematics and physiological data. His major contributions have been in development of systems approaches to the study of cardiovascular dynamics; mechanical cardiac assist devices; and transport mechanisms in the microcirculation.  He led the engineering development of the intraaortic balloon pump -- the first successful heart assist device. Dr. Jaron's research has resulted in close to 250 articles in archival journals, book chapters, and conference proceedings.  He has given a large number of invited talks across the globe.

In addition to his research activities, Dr. Jaron has made major contributions to the development of the biomedical engineering profession worldwide through his professional activities and service with the government. He has held many high level appointments in professional societies and advisory panels. He was Board member of the Biomedical Engineering Society (1983-1984); President of the Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (1986-1987); a founding member of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (1984); President of the International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering (2000-2003); and Vice President of  the International Union for Physical and Engineering Sciences in Medicine (IUPESM) from 2003-2006. Beginning with the 2002 ICSU GA in Rio, Dr. Jaron has been co-director of the trans-Union initiative on Science for Health and Well Being (SHWB) in which 12 ICSU Unions have participated.

Dr. Jaron is a Fellow of the IEEE, the AAAS, the Academy of Surgical Research, the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering, the Biomedical Engineering Society, the World Academy of Biomedical Technology, and the International Academy for Medical and Biological Engineering.  He has received numerous awards including, in 1998, the NIH Director’s award and in 2000 the IEEE Third Millennium Medal. In 2006 Dr. Jaron received the Merit Award from the International Union for Physical and Engineering Sciences in Medicine (IUPESM) -- the highest recognition awarded in this profession.

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Bryan Henry IUPAC The central theme of Prof. Henry’s research concerns the experimental and theoretical study of highly vibrationally excited molecules. At high enough energies, light interacts with molecules containing XH oscillators to prepare states that are more localized than those expected on the basis of the traditionally accepted normal mode description of molecular vibrations. His group has developed the local mode description of such vibrational states, and this description has now gained general acceptance.

These states are studied with overtone spectra, and because of localization, these overtone spectra are extremely sensitive to the properties of XH bonds. The spectra are measured with a variety of spectroscopic techniques including intracavity laser photoacoustic spectroscopy, and are used to study molecular structure and conformation, as well as intramolecular vibrational energy redistribution. His group has also been involved in theoretical studies to determine sources of local mode overtone intensity, as well as investigations of how intramolecular through space interaction affects molecular vibrations. He has authored or co-authored over 120 research papers.

Professor Henry received his B.Sc. in 1963 from the University of British Columbia and his Ph.D. from Florida State University in 1967. He started his academic career at the University of Manitoba, where he ultimately served as head of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department. In 1987 he moved to the University of Guelph where he also served as chairman of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. Occasionally over the last 25 years, he has been visiting professor at the Australian National University, the Institute for Molecular Science in Okazaki, Japan, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Otago. Recently the University of Guelph Senate elected him to the position of University Professor Emeritus.

He served as chair of the Chemistry Department Chairs of Ontario Universities, as president of the Canadian Society for Chemistry, and as chair of the Chemical Institute of Canada, of which he is also a fellow. He served as Chair of the Board of Directors of Environmental Science and Technology Canada and of the Executive of the Canadian Section of the Society of Chemical Industry. He has chaired the Canadian National Committee for IUPAC and served as scientific program chair of the 2003 IUPAC International Congress held in Ottawa in August 2003. In 2003 he was elected to terms as IUPAC Vice President (2004, 2005), President (2006, 2007), and past President (2008, 2009). He served on the ICSU EB and was Chair of the ICSU Committee on Finance from 2005 to 2008. Henry has also served in a number of other capacities, including on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Canadian Journal of Chemistry, on the Selection Committee for the Canadian Science and Engineering Hall of Fame, as a member of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council Chemistry Grant Selection Committee, and more. He has been particularly active in trying to create interactions between universities and industry.

In addition, Prof. Henry has earned a number of honors, including the Gerhard Herzberg Award of the Spectroscopy Society of Canada for Outstanding Contributions to the Science of Spectroscopy, the LeSueur Memorial Award from the Society of Chemistry Industry, and the Montreal Medal from the Chemical Institute of Canada.

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Uri Shamir IUGG Uri Shamir is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Founding Director (1992-2003) of the Stephen and Nancy Grand Water Research Institute at the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology. Prof. Shamir holds a BSc (1962) from the Technion and a PhD (1966) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He teaches, conducts research and consults in Israel and around the world on hydrology and water resources management. Since 1992 Prof. Shamir has been a consultant to the Israeli Water and Sewage Authority and is a member of the negotiating team with Israel's neighbors on water.

He was Visiting Professor in various universities and research institutes in the US and Canada, and has published widely on research and applications in hydrology of surface and ground water, water supply systems, planning, design and operation of water resources systems, water policy, and management of international waters.

Prof. Shamir was Chairman of the Israeli Association of Hydrology (1984-1986), President of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (1991-1995), Vice President of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (1995-2003) and IUGG President (2003-2007). He is Member of the Executive Board of the International Council of Science (ICSU) for the periods 2005-2008 and 2008-2011, from the GeoUnions cluster.

Prof. Shamir is Chair of the Technical Advisory Committee of the World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP-TAC), the UN-wide water programme led by UNESCO. The TAC helps to guide the preparation of the WWDR-3, the 3d Edition of the World Water Development Report, with several hundred contributors around the world, which will be ready for the World Water Forum in March 2009, in Istanbul.

He is Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Foreign Member of the Spanish Academy of Science, recipient of the 2000 International Hydrology Prize awarded by IAHS, UNESCO and WMO, and recipient of the 2003 Julian Hinds Award for significant contributions to water resources management from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

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Bruce Overmier IUPsyS James Bruce Overmier earned degrees in Chemistry (BA) and Experimental Psychology (PhD) and is now Professor of Psychology at the University of Minnesota (Graduate Faculties of Psychology, Neuroscience, Psychoneuroimmunology, and Cognitive Science). Overmier received several postdoctoral fellowships and awards including Scholar of the College Award (University of Minnesota, 1989), elected Fellow, Society of Experimental Psychologists (1992), the Quad-L Award in Psychology (University of New Mexico,1999), and  Clifford T. Morgan Distinguished Service Award in Behavioral Neuroscience & Comparative Psychology (2001), Minnesota Psychological Association Outstanding Contributions to Psychology Award, (2004),  American Psychological Association (APA) Award for Distinguished Service to Psychological Science (2005), and  the American Psychological Foundation’s  Arthur W. Staats Award /Lecture for Unifying Psychology Award (2009).

Overmier served on the governing Boards of organizations: Psychonomic Society(1983-1988),  National Academy of Science's National Committee for Psychology (1991-2002), American Psychological Society (1994-97), American Psychological Association (1999-2004), and Federation of Behavioral, Psychological and Cognitive Sciences, as well as President of the Midwestern Psychological Association (1988-89), APA Division of Physiological and Comparative Psychology (1990-91), APA Division of Experimental Psychology (1992-93), Pavlovian Society (1996-97), Society for General Psychology (2003), and is President of International Union of Psychological Science (2004-2008).   

Overmier served as Editor of the journal Learning and Motivation (1973‑1976), Associate Editor of American Psychologist (1994-2001) and the International Journal of Psychology (1994-1998).  

Occasionally, Overmier publishes with his wife, Judith Ann Overmier, who is a Professor Emeritus of Library and Information Science, University of Oklahoma.  Their most recent joint work is a CD-ROM reference tool, Psychology: IUPsyS Global Resource. They have one daughter, Larisa (Overmier) Somsel, a museum specialist and on-line bookseller.

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Ordinary Members: from National Members

Maurizio Iaccarino Italy Born in Rome, Italy, March 1938, married, four children. M.D. degree, Univ. of Naples, 1962; post-doctoral fellow, Stanford Univ. (1966-1968); visiting scientist, Univ. of Sussex, U.K. (1978-1979). Professor of Microbiology (1986); Member, Ph.D. program in Molecular and Cellular Genetics (1983-1996). Director of Research at the Institute of Genetics and Biophysics, Naples; Director of the Institute 1985 to 1993; Director of the Institute of Molecular Genetics, Alghero, 1994-1995.

Member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO), of TWAS  and of other scientific societies. Winner of several prizes (Accademia dei Lincei and others), Honoris Causa Degree in Biological Sciences, Univ. of Viterbo.
Co-author of more than 90 publications in international journals, more than 100 scientific reports; editor of several books.

Research interests: protein structure and characterization; DNA methylation; genetics and molecular biology of amino acid transport and biosynthesis; regulation of nitrogen fixation; molecular biology of the Rhizobium-legume symbiosis. Science for development.

Organizer of many international congresses, workshops, practical courses.
Science management: direction of more than 20 research groups at the Institute of Genetics and Biophysics, including the administration and supervision of almost 30 research grants from the European Commission; member of the scientific council of several institutes; member of the National Committees for Evaluation of Research; member of evaluation boards of several international organizations (European Commission, EMBO, Human Frontier Science Program, British Council, etc.); Italian delegate to survey biotechnological activities in developing countries; member of the EMBO Council and of the Board of Trustees of the Human Frontier Science Program.

Assistant Director-General for Natural Sciences at UNESCO, 1996 to 2000. Organizer and Secretary General of the UNESCO-ICSU World Conference on Science (Hungary 1999); of the World Solar Summit (Zimbabwe, 1996); of the Pan African Conference on Coastal Management (Mozambique, 1998), and others. Management of the Intergovernmental Scientific Programs (Man and Biosphere; Intergovernmental Hydrological Program; International Geological Correlation Program; Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission).

Publications on Science and Society issues:
Iaccarino, M. About the Precautionary Principle. EMBO Reports 1: 454 (2000)
Iaccarino, M. A Vision for European Science.  EMBO Reports, 2: 259 (2001)
Iaccarino, M., ed. Debt Relief for Science and Technology. Science policy studies and documents, UNESCO, 2001
Iaccarino, M. Science and Ethics. EMBO Reports 2:747 (2001)
Iaccarino, M. Science and Culture. EMBO Reports, 4: 220 (2003)
Iaccarino, M. Basic or Applied Science in Dev. Countries. EMBO Reports, 5, 437 (2004)

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Sergio Pastrana Cuba Sergio Jorge Pastrana was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1950. He graduated from the School of Letters and Arts of the University of Havana on History of English Literature and Culture in 1975, and he has done postgraduate studies at the Institute of International Relations of the Ministry of Foreign Relations of Cuba. His interests on international cooperation relate to the history of early international contacts of the Cuban scientific community, and its influence on the building of a national scientific capacity in Cuba, a subject on which he has published and lectured both, in Cuba, and abroad.

Pastrana has been involved in the establishment and coordination of international programs of cooperation of the Academia de Ciencias de Cuba since 1975. He has been a Secretary to the Cuban National Committee for ICSU since that year. Since 1983 he was appointed as head of the Department for Academic Cooperation of the Cuban Academy.

From 1992 to 1996 he was the Representative of the Government of Cuba to the Implementing Committee, and eventually to the Executive Council, of the Inter American Institute on Global Change Research (IAI). From 1994 to 1996 he was appointed as Deputy Director for International Cooperation at the Ministry for Science, Technology, and Environment of the Republic of Cuba.

Since 1996 he has been the Foreign Secretary of the Cuban Academy of Sciences. He has served in different commissions and boards for Cuban scientific institutions and societies, and presently he is a member of the Advisory Commission on International Relations of the Minister for Science, Technology, and Environment of Cuba.

Pastrana is a member of the Caribbean Academy of Sciences since 2000, and he is also a member of the Board of the Caribbean Scientific Union, an organization of all academies of sciences of the Wider Caribbean Basin. He is a representative of the Cuban Academy to the Executive Council of the Inter Academy Panel on International Issues since 2003, where he has been directly involved in the groups coordinating initiatives on Biosecurity and Genetically Modified Organisms, and presently chairs the Membership Committee.

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Abdul Hamid Zakri Malaysia Zakri is the Director, Institute of Advanced Studies, United Nations University (UNU-IAS) in Japan from 2001-08. He was the Co-Chair of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Board (2001-05), a four-year U.N. study undertaken by 1,360 experts from 95 countries to assess the state-of-health of the world’s ecosystems.

He was the Vice-President of the Academy of Sciences of the Developing World (TWAS); member of the Board of Trustees of the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES); member of the Arab Fund Fellowship Program, Expert member of the FAO/CGIAR 1st External Review (2007) of the Harvest Plus Challenge Program and member of the IAEA Senior Advisory Group on Technical Assistance and Cooperation from 2008.

Prof Zakri served as the Secretary General of the Society for the Advancement of Breeding Researches in Asia and Oceania (SABRAO) from 1981-89 and was Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia from 1992-2000. He was the Founding President (1994-2000) of the Genetics Society of Malaysia.

Zakri was the Chairman of the National Task Force that prepared the Malaysian National Policy on Biological Diversity (1996) and the Founding Chairman (1999) of the National Genetic Modification Advisory Committee (GMAC Malaysia).

A graduate of Michigan State University, USA (M.S., 1974; PhD, 1976), Prof Zakri’s interests include biodiplomacy, education for sustainable development and biotechnology and biodiversity policies for developing countries. In recent years, he had given numerous keynote addresses and invited lectures on these subjects.

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Fu Congbin China: CAST Professor Congbin Fu is a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a research Professor at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is Director of the START East Asia Center, Beijing, China.

Educated at the Department of Meteorology in Nanjing University (1957-1962), the Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Sciences (1962-1967) and the Cooperative Institute for Research of Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado (CIRES) (1981-1983), Professor Fu has long been engaged in the study of climate variability and dynamics, including air-sea interaction, air-land interaction, and climate–ecosystem interaction on global and regional scales, in particular the modeling and diagnosis of the variations of the monsoon system and its response and feedback to earth system dynamics. He has served as the chief scientist of several research projects at the national level, such as the “Study of Aridization of Northern China and Human Adaptation”. He has published about 130 scientific papers, 6 books and more than 10 chapters in co-authored books and received several national scientific prizes, such as the Second Prize of Important Research Result Awards on “air-sea interaction and short range climate variation” issued by the Chinese Academy of Science, the Second Prize of National Natural Science Award issued by State Council of China on “Response of Monsoon climate-ecosystem to global change” and a special award on international co-operation issued by the Dr. .Zhou Peiyuan Foundation.

Professor Congbin Fu has been actively involved in various international scientific organizations and collaboration. As a member of the planning group of the first global change symposium in Ottawa, then as a member of the SC-IGBP and later as a member of GAIM/IGBP and currently member of AIMES of IGBP, he has been thoroughly involved in the development of the IGBP and other international projects to promote multidisciplinary and multinational collaboration activities. Since the 1990’s, serving as a member of the TEA committee of START, member of the scientific committee of APN (Asia and Pacific network of global change research) and the director of START TEA center and Vice President of PSA, he has been involving in the development of regional networks of global change research and science capacity building in the developing world. Starting from the new millennium, he been mainly involved in the development of integrated regional study of Global change under the leadership of ESSP and START supported by ICSU. Serving as the chair of the Scientific Committee, Professor Fu is one of the main instruments in the establishment of the Monsoon Asia Integrated Regional Studies (MAIRS). In addition, Professor Fu serves also as a member of other international scientific organizations, such as the International Climate Change Committee/IAMAS of IUGG, the EB of the Pacific Science Association, the Asia and Australia Monsoon Panel (AAMP) of CLIVAR/WCRP and the Implementation Task Team of the Coordinated Enhanced Observation Period (CEOP)/WCRP, etc.