2016 SCAR Visiting Professor Bryan Storey completed his visit to Iran in May 2017. Professor Storey was Director of Gateway Antarctica, and Professor of Antarctic Studies, at the University of Canterbury until June 2017 and a SCAR Vice President from 2012 to 2016. He was hosted by Dr Nasser Zaker, Director of the Iranian National Institute for Oceanography and Atmospheric Science (INIOAS) in Tehran from 12th to 18th May 2017. Read the full report here.
The aims of Professor Storey’s visit were to introduce Antarctic Research and SCAR to the relevant Institutions in Iran; broaden the knowledge base about Antarctica in Iran; help Iran make decisions about developing its own Antarctic research programme and create an Iranian road map for a new Antarctic research program.
During his visit Prof Storey gave presentations at 2 all day workshops at INIOAS attended by up to 40 representatives, including from universities and government agencies. The workshops were also broadcast live to three additional INIOAS research centres. Prof Storey also visited and gave presentations at Shahid Beheshti University, the University of Tehran and the Geological Survey of Iran.
Professor Storey reflected “The visit was directly relevant to SCAR in that it fostered the closer integration and participation of Iran in SCAR, and provided an opportunity for me to inform Iranian researchers about SCAR. Iran became an associate member of SCAR in 2014.” He added “I will treasure the memories of my visit to Tehran and hope that I can return to help Iran build a credible Antarctic research programme in the future.”
The SCAR Visiting Professor Scheme is directed at mid- to late-career scientists and academics (more than five years after completing their PhD) whose work contributes to the research objectives of SCAR, offering the opportunity for them to undertake a short-term visit (from one to four weeks) to another SCAR member country to provide training and mentoring. The core purpose of the Visiting Professor Scheme is to build capacity in countries with smaller or less-developed Antarctic research programmes.
A full list of the SCAR Visiting Professors together with the available Visit Reports are available at the Visiting Professors Awardees webpage.