Professor Alice P. Gast was President of Imperial College London from 2014 to 2022.
As President, she promoted collaboration and societal engagement, prioritised entrepreneurship and innovation, increased Imperial’s visibility around the world, developed closer working relationships with government and stakeholders, made Imperial an influential voice on Brexit and political challenges, enhanced alumni relations and philanthropic opportunities, focused on celebrating excellence, and oversaw the rapid development of Imperial’s White City Campus.
Prior to her appointment at Imperial, Professor Gast was the 13th President of Lehigh University from August 2006 to August 2014. Other leadership roles include serving as the Vice-President for Research and Associate Provost and Robert T. Haslam Chair in Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2001 - 2006.
Professor Gast’s academic interest is in surface and interfacial phenomena, in particular the behaviour of complex fluids. She has co-authored numerous scientific publications and a classic textbook on colloid and surface phenomena. She was a faculty member at Stanford University from 1985 to 2001, being promoted to full professor in 1995. She was also affiliated with the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory.
Professor Gast is a member of a number of UK and international advisory committees and boards including the National Academy of Engineering; the League of European Research Universities (LERU), the Academic Research Council for the Singapore Ministry of Education and the Technical University of Munich (TUM)’s Institute for Advanced Study. She was made a United States Science Envoy to the Caucasus and Central Asia in 2010. In 2012, she was appointed to the board of directors of Chevron Corporation. Professor Gast is a member of the World Economic Forum Global University Leaders' Forum (GULF) and is Co-Vice-Chair of the Advisory Board for the Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution (C4IR).
Professor Gast is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the Royal Academy of Engineering, the City and Guilds of London Institute, and the Académie des Technologies, France.
She has been awarded honorary degrees by the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, the University of Notre Dame, the University of Pierre and Marie Curie, and the University of Western Ontario. In 2017 she received an honorary professorship from Tsinghua University.
Presidential Priorities
Professor Alice Gast’s priorities during her tenure have included:
Presidential Priorities
Writings and Speeches
President Gast is widely known for her influential voice on innovation, collaboration, globalisation, technology and the future of higher education. Her views and analyses have appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, BBC, Economist, Financial Times, Le Monde, World Economic Forum, South China Morning Post and Xinhua, among other global media outlets.