Clifford E. Singer, a professor of nuclear, plasma, and radiological engineering and expert on international security and energy issues, is the 2008 winner of the Madhuri and Jagdish N. Sheth Distinguished Faculty Award for International Achievement.
"This emphasizes that the University of Illinois recognizes interdisciplinary work and public engagement," said Singer of the honor.
Singer has devoted his career to issues of reducing nuclear weapons production, understanding the elements of global warming and providing alternatives, and encouraging negotiations to prevent wars over oil supplies. In doing so, he has traveled the world, engaging national and international scientists and political leaders in discussions to iron out their differences and work together for peaceful solutions.
Among his notable accomplishments was the 1997 article in Washington Quarterly, "Look Before You Leap: Practicable Steps Towards Nuclear Arms Reduction." Translated into Chinese, French, German, Japanese, and Russian, the article led to Singer’s inclusion in the Committee on Nuclear Policy that the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace organized. Singer also supervised and conducted research on the use of enriched uranium for naval propulsion. His work resulted in a proposed solution for a broadened moratorium on new nuclear weapons construction involving India and Pakistan.
He was the lead author in 2008 on "Probability Distributions for Carbon Emissions and Atmospheric Response in Climatic Change," the first data-calibrated probabilities analysis of future carbon fuel emissions. One of his latest efforts has been the 2008 book, Energy and International War: From Babylon to Baghdad and Beyond. The book details how the world learned to avoid war over coal and iron and can learn similar lessons about oil and other natural resources.
Singer began his work for ACDIS in 1986 and served as its director from 1998 to 2005. His work involved collaborating with a dozen visiting scholars from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and China. Singer taught mid-career security professionals in three international summer schools in China and South Asia. He also supervised and extended a U.S. Air Force National Defense Fellows program, reviewing work on topics as disparate as social stability in Eastern Europe, military uses of outer space, and the ethics of the use of military force.
Earning his bachelor's in mathematics at the University of Illinois in 1966 when he was just 17 years old, Singer followed with PhD studies in biochemistry at the University of California-Berkeley. His work there and as a postdoc at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology led to Singer's lifelong interest in security implications of synthetic genomics. During the 2005-06 academic year, while working at the American Association for the Advancement of Science Center for Science, Technology, and Security Policy, Singer provided the first policy briefings in the center's efforts to reduce the chance of a global pandemic based on illicit gene synthesis.
Writer: Susan Mumm editor/alumni affairs coordinator, Department of Nuclear, Plasma, and Radiological Engineering, 217/244-5382 (campus office), 217/821-6866 (cell) 217/347-2166 (home office).
Photo by L. Brian Stauffer.
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