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Professor Keith Burnett CBE, FRS, Vice-Chancellor, The University of Sheffield

Professor Keith Burnett became Vice-Chancellor of the University on 1 October 2007. Before moving to Sheffield, Professor Burnett was Head of the Division of Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences at the University of Oxford. Prior to that he was Chairman of Physics at Oxford, where he enjoyed a successful career of almost 20 years.
His academic career started in Colorado, United States, as a research associate at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics and he went on to become an assistant professor in the Department of Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
Professor Burnett was a Lecturer in the Physics Department at Imperial College for four years before returning to Oxford in 1987 as a university Lecturer in Physics & Fellow of St John’s College.

Awards

Professor Burnett was awarded a CBE for contributions to the scientific community in 2004 and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2001.

Memberships

Since arriving in Sheffield, Professor Burnett has become a member of Universities UK, Yorkshire Universities and the Russell Group. He is the current Chair of the Universities and Colleges Employers Association and the Universities Superannuation Scheme Review Group. He is Director of Worldwide Universities Network and Sheffield University Enterprises Limited. He is also a Director of Graduate Prospects Ltd, the Higher Education Careers Service Unit, the N8 research consortium and is a member of the Science and Technology Facilities Council and the UK Atomic Energy Association.

Research

Professor Burnett’s research is in the area of ultra cold atomic physics and he is the author or joint author of 200+ scientific papers in the fields of atomic, molecular and laser physics.

Personal

Married with two children, his personal interests include Chinese language and culture, poetry and walking.