Emeritus Directors
Recognizing SDCI’s past directors and their contributions to advancing science diplomacy worldwide.
Professor Ana María Cetto
INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS AT THE NATIONAL AUTONOMOUS UNIVERSITY OF MEXICO, MEXICO
Ana María holds a Master degree in Biophysics from Harvard, and Master and Ph.D. degrees in Physics from UNAM. She does research on the foundations of quantum physics at the Institute of Physics and teaches at the Faculty of Sciences, UNAM. She is the former Director of the Faculty of Sciences, the Museum of Light and the Mexican Journal of Physics, OWSD vice–president, consultant to UNESCO for the World Conference on Science, member of the UNU Governing Board, ISC Secretary General and President of the Mexican Physical Society (SMF). She is founding president of LATINDEX, member of the DOAJ Board of Directors, holder of the UNESCO Chair on Science Diplomacy and Heritage and chair of the UN Scientific Panel on the Effects of Nuclear War. She is Mexico’s Woman of the Year in 2003, and has received i.a. the UNESCO Kalinga Prize in 2023, the Oganesson Prize in 2024and the AIP Tate medal in 2025. She is also co-recipient of the 1995 Nobel Peace Prize as a member of the Executive Committee of the Pugwash Conferences, and of the 1995 Nobel Peace Prize as IAEA’s Deputy Director General.
Publications
Professor Maria Ivanova
NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY, UNITED STATES
Professor Ivanova is the Distinguished Professor of Public Policy and serves as Director of the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs at Northeastern University. Prof. Ivanova is a member of the Technical Advisory Group to the Global Commission on Science Missions for Sustainability and the Joint Scientific Committee of the World Climate Research Program as well as Ambassador for Transparency International. She was Director at the Center for Governance and Sustainability at the John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston, previously serving as a member of the Scientific Advisory Board to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. She also was a Research Scholar at the Center for Collective Intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as Chair of the Advisory Board for UN University-Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (IAS) in Tokyo, Japan (2019-2021), and Chair of the Jury for the $5 million New Shape Prize to reform global governance administered by the Global Challenges Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden (2017-2018). Her book about The Untold Story of the World’s Leading Environmental Institution: UNEP at Fifty (MIT Press 2021) provides a comprehensive analysis of the United Nations Environment Programme. Prof. Ivanova is a Fellow of the International Science Council.
Publications
