47 Notable alumni of
Free University of Brussels - VUB
Updated:
The Free University of Brussels - VUB is 941st in the world, 327th in Europe, and 7th in Belgium by aggregated alumni prominence. Below is the list of 47 notable alumni from the Free University of Brussels - VUB sorted by their wiki pages popularity. The directory includes famous graduates and former students along with research and academic staff.
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Maggie De Block
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- Graduated with Doctor of Medicine
- Occupations
- politiciangeneral practitioner
- Biography
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Maggie Celine Louise De Block is a Belgian politician of the Open VLD who has been chairing her party's group in the Chamber of Representatives since 2020.
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Alexander De Croo
- Occupations
- international forum participantpolitician
- Biography
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Alexander De Croo is a Belgian politician and businessman who has served as the prime minister of Belgium since October 2020.
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Axelle Red
- Occupations
- singeractorcomposer
- Biography
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Fabienne Demal, better known by her stage name Axelle Red, is a Belgian singer-songwriter. She has released 12 albums, including Sans plus attendre, À Tâtons, Toujours Moi and Jardin Secret. She is best known for her 1993 single "Sensualité", a hit in France in 1994.
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Jan Jambon
- Occupations
- international forum participantpolitician
- Biography
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Jan Jambon is a Belgian politician of the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) who has been serving as Minister-President of Flanders since 2019. He replaced Kris Peeters as a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives in 2007. The N-VA was, at that time, partnered with the Christian-Democratic and Flemish party. In June 2010 and May 2014 he was re-elected on an N-VA list.
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Zuhal Demir
- Occupations
- politicianlawyer
- Biography
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Zuhal Demir is a Belgian lawyer and politician affiliated to the N-VA. Demir was elected as a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives in 2010 and served there until 2017. She is currently a member of the Flemish Parliament and the Flemish minister for Justice and Enforcement, Environment, Energy and Tourism. Previously she served as Secretary of State for Poverty Reduction in the Belgian Government (2017-2018).
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Emma Meesseman
- Occupations
- basketball player
- Biography
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Emma Meesseman is a Belgian professional basketball player for Fenerbahçe of the Women's Basketball Super League and EuroLeague Women. After playing basketball in Belgium, Meesseman was drafted by the Washington Mystics with the 19th overall pick in the second round of the 2013 WNBA draft. She has also played for the Belgian national team and several European professional teams. She was named the 2011 FIBA Europe Young Women's Player of the Year and the 2019 WNBA Finals MVP. Meesseman studied physical education at Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
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Danira Boukhriss
- Occupations
- television presenterjournalist
- Biography
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Danira Boukhriss Terkessidis is a Flemish television presenter and newscaster.
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Ingrid Daubechies
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- In 1980 graduated with Doctor of Philosophy
- Occupations
- university teacherphysicistmathematician
- Biography
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Baroness Ingrid Daubechies is a Belgian physicist and mathematician. She is best known for her work with wavelets in image compression.
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Sammy Mahdi
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Sammy Mahdi is a Belgian Christian-Democrat politician, a member and the president of CD&V, who in March 2020 became a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives.
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Jean Bourgain
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- Graduated with doctorate
- Occupations
- university teachermathematician
- Biography
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Jean Louis, baron Bourgain was a Belgian mathematician. He was awarded the Fields Medal in 1994 in recognition of his work on several core topics of mathematical analysis such as the geometry of Banach spaces, harmonic analysis, ergodic theory and nonlinear partial differential equations from mathematical physics.
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Marco Formentini
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Marco Formentini was an Italian politician from the Northern League, then for the Democrats and finally for The Daisy. During his youth, he was a member of the Italian Socialist Party.
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Karel De Gucht
- Occupations
- diplomatlawyerpoliticianinternational forum participantjurist
- Biography
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Karel Lodewijk Georgette Emmerence De Gucht is a Belgian politician who was the European Commissioner for Trade from February 2010 until 31 October 2014. Previously, he served as Belgium's Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2004 to 2009 and as the European Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response from 2009 to 2010.
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Tinne Van der Straeten
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- 2004-2008 graduated with master's degree in law
- Occupations
- politicianlawyer
- Biography
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Tinne Van der Straeten is a Belgian politician who has been serving as Minister of Energy in the De Croo Government since October 2020. She is a member of the Groen party. She previously served in the Chamber of Representatives for Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde from 2007 to 2010 and later for Brussels from 2019 until 2020, when she resigned to become energy minister.
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Jef Geeraerts
- Occupations
- writer
- Biography
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Jozef Adriaan Anna Geeraerts, better known as Jef Geeraerts, was a Belgian writer.
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Marcel Vanthilt
- Occupations
- performing artistcreatorsingeractor
- Biography
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Marcel Céline Gerard Edgard Vanthilt is a Belgian singer and television presenter.
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Wouter Beke
- Occupations
- political scientistpolitician
- Biography
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Wouter Beke is a Belgian politician and a member of the CD&V. He was reelected as a member of the Belgian Senate in 2007. In 2014 he became a member of the Belgian Federal House of Representatives and was reelected in 2019. In July 2019 he succeeded Kris Peeters as Federal Minister for Work, Economy and Consumer affairs. He left the Belgian Federal Government in October 2019 to become Minister for Welfare, Public health, Family and Poverty reduction in the Flemish Regional Jambon Government.
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Louis Tobback
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Louis Marie Joseph Tobback is a Belgian politician. Tobback is a Flemish social democrat and member of the political party SP.A. He was the mayor of Leuven (1995–2018) He graduated in Romance philology at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. He is the father of Bruno Tobback, the former president of the Flemish socialist party Different Socialist Party (SP.A).
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Steven Laureys
- Occupations
- physician writeruniversity teacherneuroscientistphysicianneurologist
- Biography
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Steven Laureys is a Belgian neurologist. He is principally known as a clinician and researcher in the field of neurology of consciousness.
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Patrick Dewael
- Occupations
- politicianlawyer
- Biography
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Patrick Yvonne Hugo Dewael, is a liberal Belgian politician. A member of the Flemish Liberals and Democrats (Vlaamse Liberalen en Democraten, VLD), he served as Minister-President of Flanders from 1999 to 2003.
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Frank Vanhecke
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Frank Arthur Hyppolite Vanhecke is a Belgian politician. Vanhecke started his career in Belgian politics as a student by joining the Jong Studentenverbond and later the Nationalistische Studentenvereniging. He gave up his membership of the Volksunie in 1977 after it acceded to a much-debated package of federal reforms. Vanhecke subsequently joined the Vlaams Nationale Partij, the predecessor of the Vlaams Blok.
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Dirk Van Tichelt
- Occupations
- judoka
- Biography
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Dirk Van Tichelt is a Belgian judoka.
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Jürgen Roelandts
- Occupations
- sport cyclist
- Biography
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Jürgen Roelandts is a Belgian former professional road bicycle racer, who rode professionally between 2008 and 2020, for the Lotto–Soudal, BMC Racing Team and Movistar Team squads. He now works as a directeur sportif for his final professional team, Movistar Team.
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Adélaïde Charlier
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- In 2020 studied social science
- Occupations
- climate activist
- Biography
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Adelaide Charlier is a Belgian activist fighting for climate and social justice. She co-founded the Youth for Climate movement in Belgium. She is mainly known for her involvement in the fight against climate change. Inspired by the actions of Greta Thunberg, she is one of the leading figures, alongside Kyra Gantois and Anuna De Wever, of the first school strikes for climate in Belgium.
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Marleen Temmerman
- Occupations
- politicianuniversity teachergynaecologistphysicianobstetrician
- Biography
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Marleen Temmerman is a Belgian gynaecologist, professor and former Senator, currently heading the Centre of Excellence in Women and Child Health at Aga Khan University in Nairobi, Kenya.
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Nadia Sminate
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Nadia Sminate is a Belgian politician and is affiliated to the N-VA. She was elected as a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives in 2010.
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Bruno Tobback
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Bruno Tobback was the president of the Flemish socialist party Vooruit from 2011 to 2015. He was Minister of Environment and Pensions in the Belgian federal government from 2004 until 2007. He is the son of former minister and former mayor of Leuven Louis Tobback. He is a Licentiate in Law (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, 1992) and a Licentiate in Social and Economic Law (UGent, 1994). He was a member of the Flemish Parliament from 1995 to 2004.
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Kieran Moore
- Occupations
- physician
- Biography
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Kieran Michael Moore is a Canadian physician and public servant who serves as the current chief medical officer of health of Ontario. Prior to his appointment, he served as the medical officer of health for Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington from 2017 to 2021.
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Pattie Maes
- Occupations
- university teachercomputer scientist
- Biography
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Pattie Maes is an American scientist. She is a professor in MIT's program in Media Arts and Sciences. She founded and directed the MIT Media Lab's Fluid Interfaces Group. Previously, she founded and ran the Software Agents group. She served for several years as both the head and associate head of the Media Lab's academic program. Prior to joining the Media Lab, Maes was a visiting professor and a research scientist at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab. She holds bachelor's and PhD degrees in computer science from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Belgium.
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Annemie Neyts-Uyttebroeck
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Anne-Marie Cécile J. Neyts-Uyttebroeck is a Belgian politician and was a Member of the European Parliament for Flanders with the Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats, member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, where she sat on the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs.
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Hans Bonte
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Hans Bonte is a Belgian politician and has been a federal representative since 1995 (for the constituency of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde). He is a member of Vooruit (formerly SP.A), the Flemish social-democratic party.
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Bob Coecke
- Years
- 1968-.. (age 56)
- Occupations
- physicistcomputer scientistmathematicianuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Bob Coecke is a Belgian theoretical physicist and logician who was professor of Quantum foundations, Logics and Structures at Oxford University until 2020, when he became Chief Scientist of Cambridge Quantum Computing, and after the merger with Honeywell Quantum Systems, Chief Scientist of Quantinuum. In January 2023 he also became Distinguished Visiting Research Chair at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. He pioneered categorical quantum mechanics (entry 18M40 in Mathematics Subject Classification 2020), Quantum Picturalism, ZX-calculus, DisCoCat model for natural language, and quantum natural language processing (QNLP). He is a founder of the Quantum Physics and Logic community and conference series, and of the applied category theory community, conference series, and diamond-open-access journal Compositionality.
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Elke Van den Brandt
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Elke Van den Brandt is a Belgian green politician and a member of Groen (the Green party). She has been the Minister of Mobility, Public Works, and Road Safety within the Brussels-Capital Region government since July 18, 2019.
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Jeton Kelmendi
- Years
- 1978-.. (age 46)
- Occupations
- university teachertranslatorwriterpoetplaywright
- Biography
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Jeton Kelmendi is an academic, Albanian journalist, poet, translator, university professor and political analyst.
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Sathyabhama Das Biju
- Occupations
- environmentalistconservationistbotanistherpetologist
- Biography
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Sathyabhama Das Biju is an Indian amphibian biologist, wildlife conservationist and heads the Systematics Lab at the University of Delhi, Department of Environmental Studies. He is dubbed as the "Frogman of India" by media for his passion for frogs and for bringing fresh fascination for Indian amphibians. In an interview with Sanctuary Asia, he was introduced as "one of the world's foremost amphibian experts".
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Wouter De Vriendt
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Wouter De Vriendt is a Belgian politician, and member of Groen. He is currently a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives.
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Diederik Aerts
- Occupations
- theoretical physicistphysicist
- Biography
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Diederik Aerts is a Belgian theoretical physicist, professor at Brussels Free University (Vrije Universiteit Brussel - VUB) and founding director of the Center Leo Apostel for Interdisciplinary Studies (CLEA). He is best known for his work in quantum foundations and quantum cognition.
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Peter Rousseeuw
- Occupations
- statisticianuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Peter J. Rousseeuw is a statistician known for his work on robust statistics and cluster analysis. He obtained his PhD in 1981 at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, following research carried out at the ETH in Zurich, which led to a book on influence functions. Later he was professor at the Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands, at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, and at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. Next he was a senior researcher at Renaissance Technologies. He then returned to Belgium as professor at KU Leuven, until becoming emeritus in 2022. His former PhD students include Annick Leroy, Hendrik Lopuhaä, Geert Molenberghs, Christophe Croux, Mia Hubert, Stefan Van Aelst, Tim Verdonck and Jakob Raymaekers.
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Sébastien Godefroid
- Occupations
- sailor
- Biography
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Sébastien "Sebbe" Godefroid is a Belgian sailor.
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Jorre Verstraeten
- Occupations
- judoka
- Biography
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Jorre Verstraeten is a Belgian judoka. He won one of the bronze medals in the men's 60 kg event at the European Judo Championships in 2020 and 2022. He also won one of the bronze medals in the men's 60 kg event at the 2019 European Games held in Minsk, Belarus.
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Kathleen Smet
- Occupations
- triathlete
- Biography
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Kathleen Smet is an athlete from Belgium who competes in triathlon, becoming European champion in 2000 and 2002. She competes in Olympic and Long Distance Triathlons.
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Stéphane Ginsburgh
- Occupations
- pianist
- Biography
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Stéphane Ginsburgh is a Belgian pianist of Austrian origin. He is a piano professor at the Geneva University of Music.
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Barbara Vanderlinden
- Years
- 1965-.. (age 59)
- Occupations
- curatorart historian
- Biography
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Barbara Vanderlinden is a Belgian art historian, curator, and director.
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Max Wexler
- Occupations
- journalisttranslatoraccountantpolitician
- Biography
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Max Wexler was a Romanian socialist activist and journalist, regarded as one of the main Marxist theorist of the early Romanian workers' movement.
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Tim Trachet
- Occupations
- journalist
- Biography
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Tim Trachet is a Belgian writer, publicist, journalist and skeptic. He studied mathematics, astronomy and philosophy at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and is a reporter at the VRT, where he produces history television documentaries.
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Claude Coppens
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- In 1960 graduated with Doctor of Juridical Science in law
- Occupations
- pianistcomposer
- Biography
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Claude Coppens is a Belgian pianist and composer.
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Antoon Van den Braembussche
- Occupations
- philosopher
- Biography
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Antoon A.A. Van den Braembussche is a Flemish Philosopher of Culture, Emeritus Professor at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and a poet. He started as a poet, became a professor in the philosophy of history, and later specialized in art philosophy.
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Frank Pattyn
- Enrolled in the Free University of Brussels - VUB
- 1994-1998 graduated with Doctor of Philosophy
- Occupations
- researcherglaciologist
- Biography
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Frank Jean-Marie Léon Pattyn is a Belgian glaciologist and professor at the Université libre de Bruxelles. He is best known for developing ice-sheet models and leading model intercomparisons.
