Three new honorary fellows announced

Professor Francis Kofi Ampenyin Allotey, Professor Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell and Professor Sir Michael Pepper have been honoured in recognition of their service to physics and to IOP. Professor Allotey, the founding President of the African Physical Society and internationally respected mathematical physicist, has been a key leader in the promotion of physics both within his native Ghana and more widely across Africa. He has been working closely with IOP in the establishment of the IOP Resource Centre for teachers of physics in Ada and played a crucial role in attracting the support of the Ghanaian Government for the project. He is currently President of the Ghana Institute of Physics, Vice President at large of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics and President of Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences. Professor Bell Burnell, a Past-President of both IOP and the Royal Astronomical Society, has become a well-known figure in the world of public understanding and an inspirational figure in encouraging women into science. Her ground-breaking research career included opening up a new branch of astrophysics through her involvement in the discovery of pulsars and the construction of a radio telescope in Cambridgeshire. As an inspirational ambassador for public engagement, she was the 2010 recipient of the Royal Society’s Michael Faraday Prize for excellence in communicating science and gives upwards of 40 outreach lectures each year. Visionary researcher and business leader Professor Sir Michael Pepper, the first Managing Director of Toshiba Research Europe Ltd, Cambridge Research Laboratory, created a strategy for the business which has resulted in the company leading the development of secure quantum communications. During his academic career, Professor Pepper was the first to recognise the new physics which would emerge from dimensionality transitions which led to the creation of the field of semiconductor nanoelectronics which is now pursued worldwide. Professor Sir Peter Knight, President of IOP, said, “Whether enabling teachers to inspire students in Sub-Saharan Africa, trail blazing for female scientists or using research to create global markets, our three new honorary fellows are heroes of physics.”