Anja Andersen new Professor for the Public Understanding of Science and Technology

The professorship is the first of its kind in Denmark with the professor intended to be simultaneously an outstanding communicator of science and an active researcher with a scientific portfolio equivalent to other professors at the university, roles perfectly filled by Anja C. Andersen.

Anja C. Andersen has been appointed Denmark’s first Professor for the Public Understanding of Science and Technology.

The professorship is designed to offer a platform for the professor’s combination of scientific depth and ability to engage effectively with different audiences in order to enhance the understanding, credibility, and appreciation of the importance of the natural sciences among the general public, and to communicate the fascination and joy of science, especially with a view to increasing the uptake of technical and natural science education among young people.

The professor’s special role is to engage and challenge society as a whole, with a special emphasis on children and young people, by arousing their curiosity to understand the natural and technological world that surrounds us, from everyday life to the extremes of the cosmos.

Anja C. Andersen was appointed lecturer at the Niels Bohr Institute in 2005 after employments at the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics in Copenhagen, at Uppsala University in Sweden, and at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany. Her research has focused primarily on cosmic dust in stellar envelopes and in interstellar clouds.

She has received numerous honours and awards, including the H. C. Ørsted Silver Medal for outstanding dissemination of natural science (2016), the Danish Physical Society ́s UNESCO Year of light prize for Outstanding Public Outreach (2015), Direktør N. Bang og hustru Yrsa Bang født Troensegaards Scholarship for Outstanding Research (2014), the University of Copenhagen’s Faculty of Science Public Engagement Award (2011), Bergsøefondens Prize for Outstanding Public Engagement (2009), the Mathilde Prize for contributions towards Equity in Academia (2009), the Danish Association of Masters and PhDs Research prize (2008), the Danish Public TV and Radio’s Rosenkjær Prize for Outstanding Public Outreach (2006), the Kristine Meyer Award from the Danish Society for the Dissemination of Natural Sciences, SNU (2006), The Outstanding Young Person of the year award, TOYP 2006 for “Academic achievement and leadership”, the European Commission’s Descartes Prize for Outstanding Science Communication in the European Union (2005), the Danish National Award for Outstanding Public Engagement from the Danish Ministry of Research (2004), the Allan MacIntosh Public Engagement Award (2000), and Writer of the Year by the Danish Astronomical Society (1997). Anja C. Andersen was elected a Member of the Danish Academy of the Technical Sciences, ATV, in 2007.

Anja Cetti Andersen, Professor, Dark Cosmology Centre, Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen, Phone: +45 35 32 58 92 Mobile: +45 51 48 36 88 Email: anja@nbi.ku.dk