Catalyst announces two new patrons
Catalyst Science Discovery Centre and Museum Trust is delighted to announce that two significant national figures have agreed to became Patrons of the Centre and Museum based in Widnes. Both have said they are honoured to become Patrons and delighted to help Catalyst in whatever ways they can, in its most important work of STEM education and preservation of the heritage of the chemical industry of the NW region.
George Windsor, Earl of St Andrews, is a direct descendent through his mother, the Duchess of Kent, of Sir John Tomlinson Brunner who worked in the Catalyst building in the 1860s and went on to found the great firm of Brunner Mond at Northwich with chemist, Ludwig Mond, who had also worked in Widnes. George visited Catalyst in October 2021 and officially opened the newly-refurbished Henry and John Brunner Room where Catalyst’s extensive collection of chemical industry archives are held. He is very proud of his Brunner ancestry. George studied history at Cambridge and was a diplomat. He is currently the Chancellor of the University of Bolton and the Chairman of the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation which supports scientific as well as artistic collaboration between the UK and Japan. His father, the Duke of Kent, has long connections with Catalyst having opened a new laboratory and theatre for school and public workshops back in 2006.
Dr Helen Czerski, is a British physicist, oceanographer, writer and broadcaster based in the Mechanical Engineering Department at University College, London. Since 2012 she has been a TV Presenter for the BBC of a series of science documentaries. In 2020 she co-presented the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures. Helen was brought up in Cheshire where she attended Altrincham Grammar School for Girls before studying physics at Churchill College, Cambridge. Research at other universities across the world followed. She says she is a physicist with a love for the natural world and cares deeply about explaining the ideas and challenges in the physical world around us and championing the physics of everyday life to a worldwide audience of millions. In 2018 she was awarded the Lord Kelvin Medal and Prize of the Institute of Physics for physics communication.
Chair of Trustees, Dr Diana Leitch MBE, FRSC and CEO, Dr Lee Juby CEng, FIET said that they were both delighted and honoured that George Windsor, Earl of St Andrews and Dr Helen Czerski had agreed to become Patrons of such an important organisation as Catalyst and were willing to support and promote its work in the NW Region which covers both STEM education and also the preservation of the chemical heritage of the area.
Photographs above show George Windsor, Earl of St Andrews (credit Catalyst) and Dr Helen Czerski (credit Alex Brenner)
