Roland Jackson

My interests span the history, ethics, and policy of science and technology. Formerly a bioscientist, a science teacher, and science adviser to ICI (the international chemical company), I became Head of the Science Museum in London and then Chief Executive of the British Science Association, and Executive Chair of Sciencewise.

I am now a Visiting Fellow at the Royal Institution and an Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at University College London, where I concentrate on the history of nineteenth-century science. I am a general editor of the correspondence of John Tyndall, being published in 20 volumes by Pittsburgh University Press.

The Ascent of John Tyndall, my biography of this outstanding nineteenth-century physicist, mountaineer, and public intellectual, was published by OUP on 22 March 2018 in hardback and in 2020 in paperback.

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The Poetry of John Tyndall, with Nicola Jackson and Daniel Brown, was published in 2020 by UCL Press.

My new book, Scientific Advice to the Nineteenth-Century British State, will be published in November 2023 by the University of Pittsburgh Press.

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Beyond the history of science, my focus in the twenty-first century is on public dialogue to inform policy-making across Government on issues involving science and technology, through Sciencewise.