KU Leuven: KU Leuven awards honorary medal to VIB icons Jo Bury and Johan Cardoen
KU Leuven and the Flemish Institute for Biotechnology have been working together successfully for over 25 years. On 8 November, the university symbolically honored its partner-in-science with medals of honor for former general directors Jo Bury and Johan Cardoen.
As co-founder and general manager, Jo Bury has been at the helm of VIB since the very beginning. In April of this year, he handed over the torch to Christine Durinx, who now leads the Institute together with co-director Jérôme Van Biervliet. The latter succeeds Johan Cardoen, who was general director of the Flemish Institute for Biotechnology from 2012 to 2020.
Under the leadership of Jo Bury and Johan Cardoen, VIB helped redesign the Flemish research landscape. Rector Luc Sels: “VIB creates enormous added value for science, innovation and the economy in Flanders and beyond. The cooperation between the universities and VIB has brought Flemish research in the domains of life sciences and biotechnology to the international top. That is no small achievement.”
The intense collaboration between VIB and the Flemish universities is a great added value, according to the rector. “VIB is a model for how a strategic research center should function: not as a separate knowledge institution in a separate infrastructure and with a separate identity, but as a joint venture with powerful universities, based on a management model that allows synergy to be maximized and complementarity to be achieved. to strive.”
During the ceremony, rector Sels also personally addressed Jo Bury, who managed to leave his mark on the Flemish Institute for Biotechnology during his many years of service. Sels praised Bury’s enormous drive and commitment to VIB. In addition, the rector knows Jo Bury as a “tough negotiator” in the research world, but one who always remains fair and respectful and lives up to agreements made. “I would like to thank you personally for the constructive partnership, for the leadership shown, for the search for adequate solutions when necessary, for the collegial cooperation during my years as Rector. But I would also like to express my gratitude on behalf of the university. In some research areas, the university would not be where it is without VIB.
The KU Leuven honorary medal is an official recognition for people who have distinguished themselves academically or socially and who have made an important contribution to the realization of the university’s mission statement. Previous recipients of a university or faculty honorary medal from KU Leuven include big names such as journalist and author Geert Mak, physiologist Emile Boulpaep, historian Yuval Harari, former Director-General for Research and Innovation of the European Commission Robert-Jan Smits, virologist Peter Piot, former Leuven mayor Louis Tobback, journalist Rudi Vranckx, WHO CEO Hans Kluge, basketball star Ann Wauters and Melexis chairman Françoise Chombar.