Vebjørn Bakken has recently resigned as head of the Centre for Materials Science and Nanotechnology (SMN) to take on the position as Director of UiO:Energy, and Chemistry Professor Carl Henrik Gørbitz will start his tenure as Director of UiO:Life Sciences after the summer.
UiO:Life Sciences has been without director since I left to take on the position as vice-dean for research at MN August 2017. To this point, the most notable endeavour of UiO:Life Sciences has been the funding for so-called convergence environment - interdisciplinary research groups which together receive about 80 MNOK over four years in man-years and operating support. The second major measure from UiO:Life Sciences is the SPARK Norway Innovation Program, which will stimulate more value creation from basic research. The third visible proof of the initiative is the Oslo Life Science conference held in February each year, which has grown from year to year. This year's conference was signed off with a lighted walk with life science stations in the botanical garden that gathered nearly 3,000 citizens of Oslo. The initiative will fund a number of summer grants for students this year, but has otherwise done little for students. Carl Henrik Gørbitz, former director of education at the Department of Chemistry and a driver for modernization of education at MN, has already announced that he will invest more in education.
Vebjørn Bakken has already served as a temporary director for UiO:Energy a few months and was appointed for a four-year term in April. UiO:Energy does not have the same economic muscles as UiO:Life Sciences, but with a smaller constituency at UiO and a clear strategy, the possibility of making a difference is at least as good. As for UiO:Life Sciences, convergence is central to UiO:Energy, which, among other things, facilitates UiO's participation in both the technological and social science FME centers (Centres for Environment-friendly Energy Research). Four areas of focus have been selected: 1) Energy Transition and Sustainable Societies; 2) Carbon Capture and Storage; 3) Energy Systems; and 4) Materials for energy. For the latter three, it is research activity at MN that will give the main contributions. In addition to coordinating energy research at UiO and being a contact point for outreach, UiO:Energi has established an interdisciplinary master subject on sustainable energy systems, so education will be prioritized in both initiatives.
I am looking forward to following the development of both UiO:Energy and UiO:Life Sciences further and rest assured that Vebjørn and Carl Henrik will both be excellent directors for the all of UiO.