Honorary Fellows: Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith, FRS
Oxford Physics
Sir Chris has had a long and distinguished career, both as an accomplished theoretical physicist, and in a variety of influential and high-ranking positions. He was elected FRS in 1984 and knighted in 2001.
He was Director-General of CERN at the time that the decision to build the Large Hadron Collider was taken by CERN Council. It is difficult enough to persuade one country’s funding body to undertake investment in new facilities, but Chris brought all 18 member states on board, and also persuaded a number of other countries to contribute!
Chris is also involved in scientific capacity building and improvement of collaboration in the Middle East as President of the Council of SESAME (Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East). He is currently chair of the Council of ITER a continuation of the very important role he has played, both in the UK during his time in charge of Culham, and internationally, in the push to make energy from nuclear fusion a reality.