Mr. Claus Madsen
is Senior Advisor for International Science Policy, currently serving as Chairman of the EIROforum Coordination Group on behalf of CERN. Before that he served as an advisor to the EFDA Leader during the EFDA-JET Chairmanship of EIROforum, the partnership of the major European Intergovernmental Research Organisations that operate large research infrastructures.
His present assignment notwithstanding, since 1980, he is a staff member of ESO, Europe's intergovernmental research organisation for astronomy and astrophysics with 15 member states and facilities in Germany and Chile. ESO is also a member of EIROforum.
Claus Madsen has devoted his professional life to two strands of activities: International science policy and public science communication. Born in 1951 in Copenhagen, he holds an MSc (Science) from the Open University (UK).
International Science Policy
Between 2000-2007 he coordinated the relations between ESO and the EU. He has participated in several EIROforum working groups on aspects of European science policy, served as chairman of the EIROforum Thematic Working Group on European Affairs, was rapporteur for the first EURAB Working Group on Research Infrastructures and editor and main author of the EIROforum Science Policy Paper 'Towards a Europe of Knowledge and Innovation'. In connection with ESO's Chairmanship of EIROforum, in 2008/9, he chaired the EIROforum Coordination Group. He has assisted the ESO Director General in a range of policy issues, including negotiations with candidate countries and has represented ESO at the United Nations' Committee for the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. In 2010, he published a book on European Science Policy, entitled: ‘Scientific Europe – Policies and Politics of the European Research Area’ (see also the publication list).
Science Communication
In 1980, he joined the ESO Sky Atlas Laboratory. At the laboratory, his work focussed on scientific imaging techniques and wide-field astronomical photography of the Milky Way and the Local Group of Galaxies, including the Magellanic Clouds, for detection of large, low surface luminosity structures. From 1986, he became heavily engaged in science and society issues, organising exhibitions, producing films and giving public lectures on astronomy. He is co-author of the book 'Exploring the Southern Sky' (Springer Verlag, 1987).
He was co-ordinator for ESO's activities in the European Science Weeks (1993-2004) and he has served on the Steering Committees for the educational programmes of the EIROforum, including the Physics on Stage and Science on Stage Festivals (until 2007). He has been member of the editorial board of Science in School, the European Science Education Journal. He has published articles and given talks about science communication and –education and has co-edited a book on astronomy communication. He has also participated in experts' panels of the EC and the European Science Foundation in the field of science communication.
Furthermore, he was member of the Steering Committee for the ESOF 2008 Conference in Barcelona, the largest European conference for Science and Society issues with more than 4 000 participants. In connection with the International Year of Astronomy in 2009, Claus Madsen participated in working groups under the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and also involving UNESCO.
Claus Madsen is Co-chairman of the Universe Awareness programme, which seeks to bring astronomy to disadvantaged children in a number of countries across the world. Furthermore he serves as an Expert to the Science on Stage Europe Executive Board.
Memberships and Affiliations
Claus Madsen is a member of the International Astronomical Union, the International PCST network, the AlphaGalileo Foundation, honorary member of the European Association for Astronomy Education and honorary member of the Austrian Society for Astronomy and Astrophysics. In 2010, Minor Planet 1999 TN19, discovered by Thierry Pauwels and Henri Boffin at the Royal Observatory of Belgium, was named (91604) Clausmadsen, listed by the IAU Minor Planet Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, Ma.
