The Royal Society of Edinburgh

When I stepped foot in Edinburgh a few decades ago, I immediately fell in love with the place. That first sight of the city will never leave me, and I still adore how it holds its head high. Along with being beautiful, it is a highly educated and cultured city and has more graduates as a percentage than virtually any other place on the planet. It also hosts world-class innovation and research. While its infrastructure is never at a scale that the mighty London can achieve in terms of innovation, it is livable, walkable, and a fairly safe place to live.

The ghosts of the past

In the city, I feel the ghosts of the past and of the great scientists, academics, business leaders and engineers who helped build the city and the country. This city, a few hundred years ago, showed the world how to take an enlightened approach to science and knowledge creation. In my university, too, I get to walk through John Napier’s Tower, and have the chance to convert his logarithms into something that provides the core of the security of the Internet — discrete logarithms.

And, for my PhD, I studied the work of James Clerk-Maxwell, and who’s created a unified theory for electromagnetic waves.

John Logie Baird and others

And, so, today, I am honoured to be elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) [here], and share a space with those who have truly advanced Scotland as a country. As you should possibly know, Scotland has a long track record for punching above its weight in terms of invention and enterprise. Current fellows include many great scientists and engineers who have made Scotland their home, such as Peter Higgs and Jocelyn Bell Burnell. Former fellows include James Clerk-Maxwell and James Watt, along with the inventor of the TV:

And I love the entry for Benjmin Franklin, ad who is “interested in Electricity”:

But, for me, the mightiest of all, and possibly one of the greatest scientists of all time is James-Clerk Maxwell:

As you can see he was born in Edinburgh, and studied at the Edinburgh Academy and at the University of Edinburgh. After he graduated, he became a Professor at Aberdeen University, and then onto Kings College and Cambridge.

My advice

Education has given me everything in my career. For those starting out in their career, my core advice is to advance your education as much as you can, and achieve your full potential. No matter your background, if you have a desire to succeed, you will in the end. In fact, never stop learning, and advance yourself every single day. And don’t just learn from a superficial point-of-view; dive in and learn things deeply. If you can, read up on the classic research paper that built your field and understand the current barriers that need to be broken down. Research is great fun and can have a great impact … so go make a dent in this world (Steve Jobs quote). So, go do that MSc or PhD that you have always wanted to do.

Conclusions

This city and this country have given me everything that I would ever want in my career. They have helped shape our research and teaching, and they have been there to support us in building up collaborations, in supporting partnerships, and in allowing us the space to grow. To share a space that James-Clerk Maxwell once occupied is a privilege I will never forget. I am so lucky, too, as I get to research and teach the subjects that I love (cryptography and cybersecurity) and teach students who will build our future.