The 11th of December saw DIRDI’s final event of 2024, a special and Inaugural Dinner co-hosted by the Strategy, Statecraft, and Technology (Changing Character of War) Centre (SST-CCW) and The Durham Institute of Research, Development, and Invention (DIRDI). The event was hosted at University Church, Oxford: the primordial heart of the University, where lectures first began in the early 13th-century and a fitting place for this inaugural event.
Professor Robert Johnson, Director of SST-CCW, Professor Carl Stephen Patrick Hunter, Director-General of DIRDI and Daniel Dobrowolski, Director of DIRDI, welcomed a diverse group of academics, thinkers, technologists, and serving military to an evening of interdisciplinary discussion over dinner at the University Church, Oxford. During the dinner speeches were given by:
- Vice Admiral Andrew Burns CB OBE FDIRDI, Fleet Commander of the Royal Navy who spoke of the very current threats to UK & Global security and, by extension, the academic freedoms that democracies cherish
- Professor Clive Siviour FIMMM FDIRDI, Head of the Department of Engineering Science & Chair of Materials, University of Oxford who spoke about his research on the behaviour of structures and materials when subject to impact loading
- Dr Tobias Hermann FDIRDI, Departmental Lecturer in Engineering Science, University of Oxford who spoke about his research in hypersonics and the fluid mechanics of materials subject to hypersonic conditions
- Professor David Wallom FDIRDI, Professor in Informatics, University of Oxford who spoke about his research on critical energy infrastructure and cyber security
This was the first event of a new joint SST-CCW DIRDI collaboration which aims to explore and find the UK Science – UK Strategy – UK Statecraft synergy. We anticipate this being the first of a series of joint events co-hosted by our two institutions and greatly look forward to developing this relationship with Professor Rob and the SST-CCW. We are immensely grateful to all those who attended and helped to ensure the event’s success, particularly those who gave speeches.
As 2024 draws to a close, DIRDI has hosted events this year in all the cities from which we welcome the majority of our Fellows and Visiting Fellows: Durham, Oxford, Cambridge, and London. We look forward to continuing and expanding this in 2025, in particular with our second annual Impact & Invention Conference in Durham on the 27th of March 2025.
