Submitted by Rachel Gardner on Tue, 26/05/2026 - 13:39
The Royal Society has today (Wednesday 27 May) honoured two of our colleagues by electing them as Fellows: Professors Anuj Dawar and Srinivasan Keshav. Many congratulations to them both.
A Royal Society Fellowship is an accolade awarded to pioneers and leaders in their scientific fields. Anuj is a theoretician who has developed new methods to study computational complexity. Keshav is a researcher passionate about using our computational capabilities to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss.
The Royal Society is the UK’s national academy of sciences and the oldest science academy in continuous existence. Its aim is to recognise, promote and support excellence in science, and to encourage the development and use of science for the benefit of humanity.
Over 90 outstanding researchers from across the world have this year been elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society. They work in areas from astronomy and cancer research to mathematics and biotechnology.
Sir Paul Nurse, President of the Royal Society, said: "I am delighted to welcome this newest group of exceptional scientists to the Fellowship of the Royal Society. Their contributions reflect the highest standards of scientific endeavour.
"Whether advancing our understanding of vaccines or exploring the transformative potential of mathematics and computation, their work exemplifies the enduring value of curiosity, creativity and rigorous inquiry."
Anuj Dawar
Anuj is Professor of Logic and Algorithms here and a Fellow of Robinson College. A theoretical computer scientist, he has developed fundamental new methods, rooted in mathematical logic, for the study of computational complexity.
He is a key figure in the development of symmetric complexity, proving unconditional hardness results for a notion of computation rich enough to express many of the most important algorithms used in combinatorial optimisation.
Anuj holds a Bachelor's degree from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, a Master's degree from the University of Delaware and a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania. After working at Swansea University as a postdoctoral researcher and a lecturer, he moved to the University of Cambridge in 1999.
He served for five years as president of the European Association for Computer Science Logic. He has also, at various times, chaired the major award committees in theoretical computer science, including the Gödel Prize, the Alonzo Church Award, the Nerode Award, the Ackermann Award and the Barry Cooper Prize.
"I am honoured to be elected a Fellow of the Royal Society," he says. "It feels wonderful to have my many years of work recognized in this way. This wouldn't have been possible without the many colleagues and collaborators I have had the privilege to work with, especially the brilliant research students and postdocs who have been part of my research group."
Srinivasan Keshav
Keshav is the Robert Sansom Professor of Computer Science here and a Professorial Fellow at Fitzwilliam College. Over four decades, his research has broadened from computer networking to energy informatics and Earth system science, combining mathematical rigour with practical societal benefit. His current work lies broadly at the intersection of computer science and sustainability.
His doctoral work established the foundations for fairness and flow control in the internet. He subsequently helped to found the academic discipline of energy informatics and shape smart-grid research. He now co-leads the TESSERA project, a foundation model applying self-supervised learning to global Earth observation in support of ecologists, plant scientists, and policy makers.
Keshav is the author of two widely used graduate textbooks on networking. His honours include the Sakrison Prize, the inaugural Achievement Award from the ACM Special Interest Group in Energy Systems and Informatics, and Fellowships of the Royal Society of Canada, the IEEE, and the ACM.
"It's a great honour," says Keshav of his election as a Royal Society Fellow. "I am happy that it recognises the area of sustainability and gives an imprimatur of quality to this area of work."
