Rob Ivison Appointed as Next ESO Director for Science

The ESO Council, at its meeting this week in Garching, has approved the appointment of Rob Ivison as the next ESO Director for Science. Ivison will take up his post on 31 March 2014.

Ivison is currently a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Edinburgh’s Institute for Astronomy, based at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh, and holds an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council. He has a strong and broad track record in astronomy, with expertise covering optical, infrared, submillimetre, and radio wavelengths. His research interests range from the formation and evolution of galaxies, to mass loss in cataclysmic variable stars and the generation of cosmic dust in supernovae.

He has previously worked at the University of Toronto, Caltech, University College London, and was a Project Scientist at the UK Astronomy Technology Centre in Edinburgh. Rob has played a central role in many important cosmological and extragalactic research programmes, leading several very productive consortia. He has published 35 papers in refereed journals as first author, and over 400 in total, with 62 of these having accrued over 100 citations.

Ivison already has very good connections to ESO and its community. He is currently the chair of the ALMA Scientific Advisory Committee and of the ALMA European Scientific Advisory Committee, and a member of the ESO Scientific Technical Committee, the ESO Public Spectroscopic Survey Panel, and the science team for KMOS. He has been a recent user of the VLT and currently leads a Large Programme at APEX.

As Director for Science at ESO, Rob Ivison succeeds Bruno Leibundgut who, following a very well-deserved sabbatical, will take on new key responsibilities at ESO.