Professor Elena Boldyreva, Chief Scientist at the Institute of Solid State Chemistry and Mechanochemistry (ISSCM) SB RAS, Head of the Solid State Chemistry Division in NSU’s Natural Sciences Department, and Doctor of Chemical Sciences, was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Edinburgh University. The award is a sign of international recognition of her work in the field of mechanochemistry and research in the field of high pressure.
Research on molecular organic crystals under high pressure conditions in the 1990s was initiated by
Professor Boldyreva together with a group led by Professor Katrusyak in Poznan (Poland). Subsequently, other research groups joined, including the Center for Science at Extreme Conditions (CSEC) in Edinburgh. Initially Professor Boldyreva successfully competed with CSEC, and, then Professor Colin Pulham, Director of the University of Edingurgh School of Chemistry of the University, invited her to collaborate.
Boldyreva has been teaching at Novosibirsk State University since 1982. For many years she conducted the course on solid state chemistry. From 1988 to 2016 she conducted the «Solid State Chemistry» course she developed herself. Since 2000, she has also conducted her personal course on «Supramolecular Chemistry». Boldyreva has developed a number of other original courses and regularly lectures at national and international postgraduate programs for students and young scientists in Russia and the EU. In 2009, she was the first Russian to serve as Co-Director of the International School for High Pressure Crystallography at the Ettore Majorana Foundation and Center for Scientific Culture (Erice, Italy). She does a lot of work with schoolchildren to attract them to science and has appeared numerous times on the programs «Academic Hour» and «Scientists for Children» as well as at science festivals. Boldyreva was a member of the Russian Federation Presidential Council for Science and Education (2012-2013) and the Russian Federation Ministry of Education and Science Council (2014 - 2017).
Currently, as part of the University Year Abroad Program, the NSU Solid State Chemistry Division headed by oldyreva, hosts a one-year internship program for Masters Students from the University of Edinburgh. The Program already has six graduate students. One of the Masters Internship program students, returned to Novosibirsk State University for further postgraduate studies and will complete his degree at NSU in 2018. In 2015, the Solid State Chemistry Division, together with Edinburgh University, received a grant from the British Council and the Royal Society to conduct an international seminar, «Molecular Materials: Fundamental Research and Advanced Practical Applications». Leading lecturers and young scientists from different universities in Great Britain and Russia took part in the seminar. Boldyreva has also led international teams with participants from Novosibirsk and Edinburgh in conducting joint experiments on synchrotron radiation sources in Grenoble (France) and Oxford (Diamond Light Source). In the last few years, she has co-authored ten articles published in highly-ranked journals. Finally, this year Boldyreva was named a foreign member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
