Hans Rosling one of four new honorary doctors at Faculty of Science and Technology

Professor Charles S. Fadley works at the University of California Davis and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, specializing in molecular and condensed materials physics. His work, not least his synchrotron-light-based spectroscopic studies of surfaces, magnetic materials, and nanostructures, has inspired researchers around the world and at Uppsala. Fadley also served as chair of the two research assessments “Quality and Renewal” that were undertaken at Uppsala University in 2007 and 2011 (KoF07 and KoF11). (Q&R07 and Q&R11)

Dianne Edwards, a professor at Cardiff University and president of the Linnean Society in London, has focused on early plant fossils in her research, primarily from Wales but also from other parts of the world. She has discovered and described a great number of plants and shown in her studies that biological diversity was considerably greater during the Silurian and early Devon periods than was previously thought. Her research has shed new light on the evolutionary processes that took place in these periods, when the first species colonised land. With the help of fossils, Edwards has also been able to show that many fires occurred during the Silurian period.

Hans Rosling, a professor of international health at the Karolinska Institutet, completed his PhD at the Uppsala University Faculty of Medicine in 1986. Among other activities, he worked as a district physician in Mozambique and was one of the founders of Doctors Without Borders in Sweden. Rosling is being honoured for his indefatigable popularisation work, among other things, and his unique ability to enthusiastically and insightfully present key facts about the state and development of the world. He is one of the founders of the Gapminder Foundation, which aims to help promote global development by making statistics easier to use and understand. Their innovative animated statistics have been an international success. Rosling teaches at several universities about global variations in health and has served as an adviser to Sida and WHO, among other organisations.

Yoshinori Tokura, a professor at Tokyo University and research director at RIKEN, is one of the world's ten most-cited physicists over the last 30 years. His research targets a broad field in physics, chemistry, and materials research, including high-temperature superconducting materials and strongly correlated electron systems with spintronic and multiferroic properties. These fields are closely related to experimental and theoretical research underway at Ångström Laboratory, Uppsala University.