Heather Staines Interviews Kamran Naim, Head of Open Science, CERN

"Audio from the 2024 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. Heather Staines, Senior Strategy Consultant, Delta Think interviews Kamran Naim, the Head of Open Science at CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire).

CERN was founded in 1954 as a project not only to advance our fundamental understanding of basic scientific questions about who we are and where we come from but also as an instrument to get European countries to work together on a common scientific mission. It is the world’s largest particle physics laboratory and largest research organization. In this conversation, Kamran tells us about his work as Head of Open Science at CERN to make all CERN research freely and publicly accessible. Kamran has helped build national digital library access systems in countries like Pakistan, Madagascar, and Iraq. He has supported the Iraqi Virtual Science Library to reconnect scholar’s post-conflict and has worked with USAID on extending similar models across North and East Africa. Kamran was recruited to CERN to manage SCOAP³, the world’s largest collective OA initiative, serving over 3,000 institutions. He works closely with librarians across the globe through CERN's partnerships and programs, and praises librarians as essential allies in open science."