Nils Chr. Stenseth will become a strategic adviser at the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences after leaving as head of the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis (CEES) at the Department of Biosciences.

CEES and new leadership
For many years Nils Chr. Stenseth has been a leading researcher and a driving force for the development of research at the faculty, and especially at the Department of Biosciences. From 2007 until now he has been the leader of CEES, which was a Norwegian Centre of Excellence or CoE (SFF in Norwegian) from 2007 until 2017. CEES will continue as a centre and a section at the Department of Biosciences after the CoE period is over. The Department of Biosciences has started work on finding a new leader for CEES; initially, there will be an interim leader for CEES, and as soon as the interim leader is in place, Stenseth will take up his new position at the faculty.

Nils Chr. Stenseth,. Photo: Eva Simensen

Thank you for your efforts, so far!
Before I move on to what Stenseth will work with, I would like to thank Nils Chr. Stenseth for his efforts as a researcher, research leader, research policy driver and not least leader of an CoE for more than 10 years. This effort has yielded great results, something you can read more about in this article in Titan where Rector Svein Stølen and the administrative director of the Norwegian Research Council John Arne Røttingen applaud CEES and Stenseth for the results achieved. From the same article, I want to quote myself: "We are a strong research faculty where CEES, with its extensive research production and visibility both nationally and internationally, has been and is one of the spearheads. I am very pleased that we will continue CEES as a centre, and I look forward to new scientific discoveries from this strong environment."

Advisor on strategic issues
It is important to emphasize that Stenseth in his new role as an advisor at the faculty will continue being a professor and researcher. Stenseth's research activity will still be at the Department of Biosciences, and at CEES. However, Stenseth will use a significant proportion of his time on strategic tasks for the faculty. Here, Stenseth's experience, e.g. working with the European Research Council (ERC) for many years, will be useful.

Stenseth's duties at the faculty will be linked to the establishment and development of strategic initiatives, including participation, on behalf of the faculty, in national and international contexts where the faculty has important interests. The tasks will in particular be directed towards the development of basic long-term research via the establishment of new outstanding research environments, and the development of the faculty as an internationally oriented research faculty at a high international level. In this picture, the faculty's focus on young researchers is important, and we look forward to Stenseth's contribution as a mentor and counselor in their career development.

It has always been a great pleasure for me to have Nils Chr. Stenseth on the team, and I look forward to continued collaboration with Stenseth in his new position.