About
The ATOM Society was formed shortly after the first ATOM Festival of Science & Technology in 2014. With the Festival holding an annual week of talks and events, it was felt that another organisation should be started to hold events all year round. The ATOM Society is an independent organisation with its own committee, but maintains strong links with the ATOM Festival.
Both the ATOM Festival and Society began as initiatives of an organisation called the Choose Abingdon Partnership, aimed at boosting the town's profile and economic development. The town is uniquely positioned to do this because of its proximity to the Rutherford Appleton Laboratories, Culham Science Centre, Oxford University and many high-tech businesses.
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Since the Society began, the venue for talks has changed three times as our membership has grown. Monthly meetings now take place in the clubroom of Abingdon United Football Club, which can hold up to 100 people, provides ample parking and a bar.
Talks cover a wide variety of topics, spanning many fields of science and technology, such as; The Higgs Boson, driver-less cars, black holes, genetics, the mathematics of knitting, perception, fusion energy, circadian rhythms & space debris. Speakers have included eminent academics and leading researchers in hi-tech businesses, as well as young post-doc scientists talking about their research. For a full list of past talks, visit our Previous Events page.
During the COVID pandemic of 2020 - 2021 monthly talks continued without interruption, with speakers presenting from their homes and the talks being live-streamed on the internet. Many of the talks recorded during this period are still available on our YouTube channel.
The Committee
Stephen Clarke
Chair
chair@atomsociety.org.uk
The Principal of Cherwell College, Stephen is a former British Diplomat and First Secretary for the UK Government responsible for education and social development in Southern Africa, Eastern Europe, South Caucasus and Central Asia. He also acted as a policy analyst on Education Skills and Conflict Resolution for intergovernmental relations. Stephen also has extensive experience on advising businesses and NGOs on democracy, education and human rights issues.
Stephen holds a BA (Hons) in Politics and Sociology from the University of Southampton. He is a member of Mensa, the Institute of Directors, Royal Overseas League, the Oxford Union, the University Club and a former member of World Bank Supervisory Board and Regional Development Agencies.
Peter Williams
Secretary
secretary@atomsociety.org.uk
After studying at Oxford and Manchester universities, Peter embarked on a research and development career in the pharmaceutical industry, where he stayed until retiring in April 2020. Peter devoted most of his last 20 years' work to novel ways to treat HIV infections.
Richard Gardner
Treasurer
treasurer@atomsociety.org.uk
Richard gained a PhD in Organic Chemistry from Leicester University in 2002. After a postdoctoral position at the University of Central Florida and a brief stint at Evotec, he worked for Ludger Ltd. as a Senior Scientist for ten years. His main focus is combining Glycobiology and Glycoanalysis with robotics. He loves 'craft' beer, Doctor Who, music from the 1990's and science fiction books and films.
Rosalind Schilizzi
Programme Co-ordinator
Rosalind Schilizzi spent her summers during university working at a company dedicated to developing a novel diagnostic method for Urinary Tract Infections. After graduating with a Bachelor's degree in Biomedical Science from the University of Bristol in 2024, she worked as a Research Assistant at a drug discovery biotechnology company. She has recently begun her PhD at Queen Mary University of London, where she is developing a skin-on-chip model to evaluate host-microbiome interactions in feminine care.
Professor Frank Close
Frank Close OBE FRS is Professor Emeritus of Theoretical Physics at Oxford University and Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. He is a particle physicist and author of several popular science books, most recently the award-winning "Elusive" – the story of the elusive Higgs boson and its equally elusive inspiration, Peter Higgs.
Professor Russell Foster
Professor Foster is the Head of Oxford's Nuffield Laboratory of Ophthalmology, the founder and Director of the Sleep and Circadian Research Institute and is a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford. He was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society in 2008, the Royal Society of Biology in 2011 and the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2013. Russell was honoured by being appointed as a Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in 2015 for services to Science. He has been a member of the Governing Council of the Royal Society, and he established the Royal Society Public Engagement Committee, which he led for six years. He was the Chair of the Cheltenham Science Festival for six years and is currently a Trustee of the Science Museum. Professor Foster has published over 280 scientific papers and has received multiple national and international awards, including most recently the "Daylight Prize". He has co-written four popular science books and his fifth for Penguin will be published in March 2022.
Nicola Duxbury
Nicola graduated from Leicester Polytechnic in 1986 with a BSc in Science and the Environment (Biotechnology). After completing a two-year contract as a research assistant, she moved to Oxfordshire to join Cellmark Diagnostics. Whilst there she carried out DNA finger-printing analysis for paternity and immigration purposes, before moving into the development and validation of genetic diagnostics tests. She is currently managing a team of scientists at Oxford Biomedica who are at the forefront of the cell and gene therapy field. She has been a member of the ATOM Society for a number of years and also helps with the annual ATOM Science & Technology Festival.
Ben Bryant
Ben earned his PhD in Condensed Matter Physics at University College London, where he worked on low-temperature scanning probe microscopy of magnetic materials. As part of his postdoctoral research he moved to TU Delft in the Netherlands, where he worked on nano-magnetism. In 2015, Ben gained a research fellowship at the High Field Magnet Laboratory in Nijmegen, where he worked on scanning probe instrumentation, and other experiments, using their ultra-high-field magnets. In 2019, he moved into industry, and is now a senior development engineer at Oxford Instruments, where he works in research and development of superconducting magnets.
Suma Setty
Suma received her MEng degree in Electrical/Electronic Engineering from Imperial College, London in 1993. She went on to work as a Research Assistant and began a PhD at Imperial before working as an analogue RF design engineer at Ericsson Microelectronics and Phyworks. After taking time out of her career to raise her children, she took on a very different challenge – joining her husband in running their farm, which they have managed together since 2010. Alongside her professional journey, Suma has played a leading role in the local amateur youth music community, running Thames Vale Youth Orchestra and also volunteering with Oxford Concerto Orchestra and Abingdon Music Festival.
Will Selby
After studying Physics at the University of Southampton, Will started a career in IT support. In 2014 he transitioned to working in web development and now works for a London-based web consultancy.