Dates

• Existence: 1940 - 2007
• Usage: 1940 - 2007

Biography

Professor Sir Gareth Gwyn Roberts was Vice Chancellor of the University of Sheffield from 1991 to 2000. He was born in Bangor, North Wales in 1940. He studied at University College, Bangor, gaining a first-class honours degree in physics in 1961 before completing his PhD in the field of semiconductor physics. He was appointed lecturer there in 1963. In 1966 he moved to the Xerox Corportion in Rochester, New York. In 1968 he joined the University of Ulster at Coleraine helping to establish the department of Physics there. He left Ulster after eight years to join the University of Durham as Professor of Applied Physics. In 1985 he became chief scientist at Thorn EMI as well as taking a visting professorship in engineering science and fellowship at Brasenose College, Oxford. Roberts made great contributions outside of the university: he contributed to the Prime Minister’s Advisory Council on Science and Technology, he was a member of the Higher Education Funding Council for England, a Chairman to the Engineering and Technology Board, founding the Journal of Molecular Electronics, and encouraged the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) interests in young people. He was elected chairman of the Committee of Vice Chancellors and Principals and the President of the Institute of Physics and in 1997 was knighted for services to education. He bacame President of Wolfson College, Oxford in 2001. Roberts died in Oxford in 2007. Sources: The University of Sheffield 'Firth Hall portraits.'; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

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