Professor Simon Leather – NBN Conference 2017

On the morning of Thursday 16th November, Professor Simon Leather will give the following keynote address in the session entitled “NBN progress and partnership”.

“Why I joined the Twitterati – Making entomology and natural history visible using social media” – Tweeting, blogging and other social media are seen by many scientists as being of no relevance to their work. I too once held a similar opinion. Using personal examples I show that the use of social media platforms by scientists and organisations can play a valuable role in bringing science to a wider audience and encouraging wider participation in citizen science projects.

Professor Simon Leather is Professor of Entomology at Harper Adams University, where he has been since 2012.

He is an applied entomologist, focusing mainly on problems in agricultural, horticultural and forest crops, but with an additional interest in urban biodiversity and insect conservation. He graduated from Leeds University with a First Class Honours degree in Agricultural Zoology in 1977 and completed his PhD in aphid ecology at the University of East Anglia in 1980. He has worked in Finland, the Forestry Commission, Imperial College London before taking on his current role at Harper Adams University.

He believes passionately in outreach and regularly speaks at schools as well as to local Natural History Societies, the WI, U3A and others. He blogs at Don’t Forget the Roundabouts and can be found on Twitter as @Entoprof.