New Members of the World Innovation Foundation
Dr. Buzz Aldrin DSc h.c. Dr.mult
Dr. Aldrin is the chairman of STARCRAFT Enterprises and the second man in the history of the world
to set foot on the Moon. After completing pilot training in 1952 he flew combat missions in the Korean War for his country and at an early age risked life
and death in the process. Dr.Aldrin was therefore accustomed to risk before his momentous achievement in the history of the world. He later became
Flight Commander, 36th Tactical Fighter Wing in Germany and completed his astronautics studies at M.I.T. in 1963. That year Dr. Aldrin was selected
by NASA as an astronaut and was later assigned to the Manned Spacecraft Centre, Houston. In 1966 he was the pilot of the backup crew for the Gemini
1X mission and pilot for the Gemini X11 mission. Thereafter Dr. Aldrin was the backup command module pilot for Apollo V111 and in 1969 he was
lunar module pilot for the Apollo X1 mission which brought man and himself onto the moon for the first time in the history of all humankind. In the
annals of scientific discovery this one sole achievement made possible mans future destiny in space. Without Dr. Aldrins great courage where his life was
put uncompromisingly on the line, this great feat would not have been possible. It is to these great men of discovery that the world will always be in their
debt for they have shown the way forward. Between 1971-72 he was commandant of the Aerospace Research Pilot School and from 1972 onwards Dr.
Aldrin has been President of Research and Engineering Consultants Incorporated and consultant to the JRW Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He has many
honorary degrees, decorations and honours from throughout the world and Dr. Aldrin is a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and
Astronautics and a Honorary Member of the Royal Aeronautical Society. He has several publications to his name including 'First on the Moon: A Voyage
with Neil Armstrong', 'Return to Earth' and 'Men from Earth'. Dr. Aldrin's driving force is to make possible space travel for all mankind where this again
is a momentous challenge without precedence. The Foundation says that with a little more help he will succeed. Those in 'high places' should take heed
and extremely seriously what he says.
Nobel Laureate Prof.Dr. Rita Levi-Montalcini Dr.h.c.mult.
'My twin sister Paola and I were born in
Turin on April 22, 1909, the youngest of four children. Our parents were Adamo Levi, an electrical engineer and gifted mathematician, and Adele
Montalcini, a talented painter and an exquisite human being. Our older brother Gino, who died twelve years ago of a heart attack, was one of the most
well known Italian architects and a professor at the University of Turin. Our sister Anna, five years older than Paola and myself, lives in Turin with her
children and grandchildren. Ever since adolescence, she has been an enthusiastic admirer of the great Swedish writer, the Nobel Laureate Selma Lagerlöf,
and she infected me so much with her enthusiasm that I decided to become a writer and describe Italian saga "à la Lagerlöf". But things were to take a
different turn. The four of us enjoyed a most wonderful family atmosphere, filled with love and reciprocal devotion. Both parents were highly cultured
and instilled in us their high appreciation of intellectual pursuit. It was, however, a typical Victorian style of life, all decisions being taken by the head of
the family, the husband and father. He loved us dearly and had a great respect for women, but he believed that a professional career would interfere with
the duties of a wife and mother. He therefore decided that the three of us - Anna, Paola and I - would not engage in studies which open the way to a
professional career and that we would not enroll in the University. Ever since childhood, Paola had shown an extraordinary artistic talent and father's
decision did not prevent her full-time dedication to painting. She became one of the most outstanding women painters in Italy and is at present still in full
activity. I had a more difficult time. At twenty, I realized that I could not possibly adjust to a feminine role as conceived by my father, and asked him
permission to engage in a professional career. In eight months I filled my gaps in Latin, Greek and mathematics, graduated from high school, and entered
medical school in Turin. Two of my university colleagues and close friends, Salvador Luria and Renato Dulbecco, were to receive the Nobel Prize in
Physiology or Medicine, respectively, seventeen and eleven years before I would receive the same most prestigious award. All three of us were students of
the famous Italian histologist, Giuseppe Levi. We are indebted to him for a superb training in biological science, and for having learned to approach
scientific problems in a most rigorous way at a time when such an approach was still unusual. In 1936 I graduated from medical school with a summa
cum laude degree in Medicine and Surgery, and enrolled in the three year specialization in neurology and psychiatry, still uncertain whether I should
devote myself fully to the medical profession or pursue at the same time basic research in neurology. My perplexity was not to last too long. In 1936
Mussolini issued the "Manifesto per la Difesa della Razza", signed by ten Italian 'scientists'. The manifesto was soon followed by the promulgation of
laws barring academic and professional careers to non-Aryan Italian citizens. After a short period spent in Brussels as a guest of a neurological institute, I
returned to Turin on the verge of the invasion of Belgium by the German army, Spring 1940, to join my family. The two alternatives left then to us were
either to emigrate to the United States, or to pursue some activity that needed neither support nor connection with the outside Aryan world where we
lived. My family chose this second alternative. I then decided to build a small research unit at home and installed it in my bedroom. My inspiration was a
1934 article by Viktor Hamburger reporting on the effects of limb extirpation in chick embryos. My project had barely started when Giuseppe Levi, who
had escaped from Belgium invaded by Nazis, returned to Turin and joined me, thus becoming, to my great pride, my first and only assistant. The heavy
bombing of Turin by Anglo-American air forces in 1941 made it imperative to abandon Turin and move to a country cottage where I rebuilt my mini-
laboratory and resumed my experiments. In the Fall of 1943, the invasion of Italy by the German army forced us to abandon our now dangerous refuge in
Piemonte and flee to Florence, where we lived underground until the end of the war. In Florence I was in daily contact with many close, dear friends and
courageous partisans of the "Partito di Azione". In August of 1944, the advancing Anglo-American armies forced the German invaders to leave Florence.
At the Anglo-American Headquarters, I was hired as a medical doctor and assigned to a camp of war refugees who were brought to Florence by the
hundreds from the North where the war was still raging. Epidemics of infectious diseases and of abdominal typhus spread death among the refugees,
where I was in charge as nurse and medical doctor, sharing with them their suffering and the daily danger of death.The war in Italy ended in May 1945. I
returned with my family to Turin where I resumed my academic positions at the University. In the Fall of 1947, an invitation from Professor Viktor
Hamburger to join him and repeat the experiments which we had performed many years earlier in the chick embryo, was to change the course of my life.
Although I had planned to remain in St. Louis for only ten to twelve months, the excellent results of our research made it imperative for me to postpone
my return to Italy. In 1956 I was offered the position of Associate Professor and in 1958 that of Full Professor, a position which I held until retirement in
1977. In 1962 I established a research unit in Rome, dividing my time between this city and St. Louis. From 1969 to 1978 I also held the position of
Director of the Institute of Cell Biology of the Italian National Council of Research, in Rome. Upon retirement in 1979, I became Guest Professor of this
same institute. The Foundation is greatly honoured by her presence and her wisdom is a greatly needed commodity in the onward progress of the world
and its people. Professor Levi-Montalcini has shown that women can reach the greatest heights in scientific discovery and she is a pre-eminent example to
all other aspiring women in the world of science and technology today.(Extracts taken from the Nobel Foundation Web-Page)
Professor O.O. Akinkugbe CON MD DPhil FRCP FWACP FAS NNOM h.c.Dr.mult
Professor Akinkugbe is the Professor Oladipo Olujimi Akinkugbe, Atobase of Ife, Babalofin of IjebuIgbo CON MD DPhil FRCP FWACP FAS NNOM
h.c.Dr.mult is the Pro-Chancellor and Chair of the Council of Port Harcourt University and Professor of Medicine at the University of
Ibadan, Nigeria. He was educated at the Universities of London(MD), Liverpool(DTM&H), Oxford(DPhil) and Ibadan. Professor
Akinkugbe started his career in 1958 as a House Surgeon at London Hospital and in 1959 was House Physician at King's College
Hospital, London. From 1962-64 he was Commomwealth Resident Fellow at Balliol College and Regius Department of Medicine at
Oxford University. Professor Akinkugbe was the Rockefeller Visiting Fellow at the US Renal Centres in 1966 and Visiting Fellow in
Medicine at the Universities of Manchester, Cambridge and London in 1969. He then returned home to his country and take up the
appointment of Dean(70-74) and Head(1972) of the Department of Medicine together with being the Chairman of the Committee of
Deans at the University of badan from 1972-74. From 1972-75 Professor Akinkugbe was Adviser on post-graduate Medical Education
to the Federal Government of Nigeria. He joined the WHO Expert Advisory Panels on Cardiovascular Diseases in 1973-78 and then the
WHO's Health Manpower in 1979 where he still holds the position.Between 1974-75 Professor Akinkugbe was Visiting Professor of
Medicine at Harvard University. He became Principal of the University of Ilorin between 1975-78 and where in 1977 he became the
University's Vice-Chancellor. In 1982-90 Professor Akinkugbe was a Member of the Universities Grants Committee of the Ugandan
Government, OAU Scientific Panels on Health Manpower Development and the Council of International Society Of Hypertension. Since
1986 Professor Akinkugbe has been on the Board of Trustees of the African Association of Nephrology and in the same year to 1990
was Secretary to the WHO 1984 Technical Discussions. From 1986-90 he was appointed Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Council
at Port-Harcourt University.In 1990 Professor Akinkugbe joined the WHO Advisory Council on Health Research and where he still
gives his advice and wisdom today. In 1992 Professor Akinkugbe became Chairman of the National Implementation Comission on
Review of Higher Education in Nigeria. He has been appointed to many bodies including President of the Nigerian Association of
Nephrology(1987-90), Member of the Governing Council and Board of Trustees, Obafemi Awolowo Foundation(1992), International
Society of Hypertension(82-90) and Board of Trustees of the African Association of Nephrology(1986). Professor Akinkugbe has been
on the editorial boards of many distinguished publications including the Journal of Hypertension(1984-90), Human Hypertension(1988-
), Kidney International(1990-), Blood Pressure(1991-) and News of Physiological Sciences(1992-). His publications include 'High
Blood Pressure in the African', 'Priorities in National Health Planning', 'Cardiovascular Disease in Africa' and Clinical Medicine in the
Tropic Series(1987-)' toether with his many contributions to many medical journals in Africa, Europe and America. Above all his many
unique qualities he is a man of great perception, foresight and understanding in what is needed to make a better life for all future
generations in the world of tomorrow.