Conférences principales

La gouverneure générale du Canada, Son Excellence la très honorable Julie Payette

Avant de devenir gouverneure générale, Julie Payette a été astronaute, ingénieure, communicatrice scientifique et administratrice de sociétés.

De 1992 à 2013, M^me Payette a travaillé comme astronaute et effectué deux missions dans l’espace. Elle a aussi occupé pendant de nombreuses années le poste d’agente de liaison « capcom » (capsule communicator) au Centre de contrôle de mission de la NASA, à Houston au Texas, et elle a été astronaute en chef de l’Agence spatiale canadienne.

M^me Payette est très reconnue pour avoir élaboré des politiques axées sur la promotion de la science et de la technologie. De 2011 à 2013, elle a travaillé comme chercheure au Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, à Washington D.C., et elle a été nommée déléguée scientifique du Québec aux États-Unis. De juillet 2013 à octobre 2016, elle a été directrice du Centre des sciences de Montréal.

Son Excellence Aminata Touré, présidente du Conseil économique, social et environnemental du Sénégal et ancienne Première ministre du Sénégal

Dr. Touré served as the Prime Minister of Senegal from September 2013 until July 2014. She was also Justice Minister from 2012 to 2013 where she focused on anti-corruption campaigns. She is currently a special envoy of President Macky Sall for Internal and External Affairs. Since 2014, she led several Presidential election observation missions including in Mauritius, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia and Kenya, where she co-led the first round of the election observation mission on behalf of the Carter Center with then-US Secretary of State, John Kerry. Dr. Aminata Touré will be a Harvard Kennedy School Fisher Family Fellow with the Future of Diplomacy Project in the academic year 2018-2019.
( Biographie disponible en anglais seulement )

Son Excellence Cheick Modibo Diarra, président du Réseau juridique africain et ancien premier ministre du Mali

Dr Diarra est un astrophysicien, businessman et politicien malien. Il a été Premier ministre du Mali par intérim d’Avril à Décembre 2012. Il a été président de Microsoft Africa de 2006 à 2011. Il est ambassadeur de bonne volonté pour l’Unesco et a également servi en tant que PDG de l’African Virtual University, basée au Kenya, en 2002 – 2003.

En 1984, Dr Diarra a rejoint le Jet Propulsion Laboratory en Californie (une division de la NASA). Là-bas, il a participé à plusieurs missions : Magellan à Venus, Ulysses vers les pôles du Soleil, Galileo à Jupiter et Mars Observer et Mars Pathfinder. Il a par la suite dirigé le Mars Outreach Program de la NASA.

Naomi Oreskes, professeure d’histoire des sciences à l’université Harvard

Areas of Research: History of Environmental Sciences, Science Policy, Philosophy of Science, Science and Religion, STS, Technology and Society, Women and Gender StudiesNaomi Oreskes is Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. A world-renowned geologist, historian and public speaker, she is a leading voice on the role of science in society and the reality of anthropogenic climate change.

Oreskes is author or co-author of 7 books, and over 150 articles, essays and opinion pieces, including Merchants of Doubt (Bloomsbury, 2010), The Collapse of Western Civilization (Columbia University Press, 2014), Discerning Experts (University Chicago Press, 2019), Why Trust Science? (Princeton University Press, 2019), and Science on a Mission: American Oceanography from the Cold War to Climate Change, (University of Chicago Press, forthcoming). Merchants of Doubt, co-authored with Erik Conway, was the subject of a documentary film of the same name produced by participant Media and distributed by SONY Pictures Classics, and has been translated into nine languages. A new edition of Merchants of Doubt, with an introduction by Al Gore, will be published in 2020.
( Biographie disponible en anglais seulement )

Daya Reddy, président du Conseil international des sciences

Daya Reddy holds the South African Research Chair in Computational Mechanics at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. Following undergraduate studies in civil engineering at the University of Cape Town and a Ph.D. degree at Cambridge University in the UK, he spent a year as a postdoctoral researcher at University College London, then returned to the University of Cape Town, where he held a joint position in civil engineering and applied mathematics. He was appointed professor of applied mathematics in 1989. From 1999, he served a seven-year term as dean of the faculty of science.
( Biographie disponible en anglais seulement )

Dre Soumya Swaminathan, première conseillère scientifique en chef à l’Organisation mondiale de la santé

Sir Patrick Vallance, conseiller scientifique en chef du Royaume-Uni

Sir Patrick Vallance FRS FMedSci FRCP is Government Chief Scientific Adviser (GCSA) and Head of the Government Science and Engineering (GSE) profession. His personal research was in the area of diseases of blood vessels and endothelial biology.

Patrick was President, R&D at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) from 2012 until 2017. Prior to this, he was Senior Vice President, Medicines Discovery and Development. He joined the company in May 2006 as Head of Drug Discovery. He was a member of the GSK Board and the Corporate Executive Team. During his period as head of R&D over 14 new medicines were approved for use worldwide, for diseases ranging from cancer to asthma and HIV.

Prior to joining GSK, he was a clinical academic, Professor of Medicine and led the Division of Medicine at UCL. He has over 20 years’ experience of basic and clinical research, and was a consultant physician in the NHS. His research spanned from work on medicinal chemistry and structural biology, through to cellular work, studies in humans and use of large electronic health record databases.
( Biographie disponible en anglais seulement )