Basarab Nicolescu

Basarab Nicolescu (born March 25, 1942, Ploieşti, Romania) is an honorary theoretical physicist at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Laboratoire de Physique Nucléaire et de Hautes Énergies, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris. He is also a professor at the Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania and Docteur ès-Sciences Physiques (PhD), 1972, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris. He was appointed Professor Extraordinary at Stellenbosch University, South Africa for the period 1 January 2011 to 31 December 2016 and was elected as Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS) Fellow in 2011.

He is the president and founder of the International Center for Transdisciplinary Research and Studies (CIRET), a non-profit organization (167 members from 30 countries).

In addition, he is the co-founder, with René Berger, of the Study Group on Transdisciplinarity at UNESCO (1992) and the founder and Director of the "Transdisciplinarity" Series, Rocher Editions, Monaco and of the "Romanians of Paris", Piktos/Oxus Editions, Paris.

He is also a specialist in the theory of elementary particles. Basarab Nicolescu is the author of more than one hundred thirty articles in leading international scientific journals, has made numerous contributions to science anthologies and participated in several dozens French radio and multimedia documentaries on science.

Basarab Nicolescu is a major advocate of the transdisciplinary reconciliation between science and the humanities. He has published many articles on the role of science in contemporary culture in journals in France, Romania, Italy, United Kingdom, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Japan and in the USA.

The Academy of Transdisciplinary Learning and Advanced Studies (ATLAS), Texas, USA decided to institute the "Basarab Nicolescu Transdisciplinary Science & Engineering Award". The first prizes were attributed in 2014.