‘Engineering a Sustainable Future: The STEM behind Net Zero’ Expert Panel and STEM Alumni Awards 2026

We are pleased to invite you to City St George's for the STEM Alumni Awards Ceremony 2026. This year's edition will feature a panel discussion on the theme of ‘Engineering a Sustainable Future: The STEM behind Net Zero’, chaired by Professor Richard Curran, Professor of Aviation Management at City St George's. Our expert panellists work across aviation, energy, advanced engineering, and cybersecurity. The conversation will explore where the hard problems lie in reaching net zero, and how the next generation of STEM graduates can help solve them. This will be followed by a Q&A, where you are invited to pose your own questions to the panel and share your views.

The evening will also include the presentation of the STEM Alumni Awards to honour those who are making an outstanding impact.

The 2026 award winners are:

• Distinguished STEM Alumni Award: Giancarlo Buono FRAes (MSc Air Transport Management, 2001)
• Distinguished STEM Alumni Award: Professor Robert Wood FREng (BSc Mechanical Engineering, 1982)
• Excellence in STEM Achievement Award: Dr Marco Edoardo Rosti (PhD Aeronautical Engineering, 2016)
• Excellence in STEM Achievement Award: Rishi Preetam Thiruthani (MSc Cyber Security, 2022)

Hosted by Professor Bashar Nuseibeh, Executive Dean of the School of Science & Technology, this event provides an excellent opportunity to celebrate the achievements of this year's award recipients, network with alumni and leading academic and professional experts, and gain invaluable insight into the field of sustainability and STEM behind net zero.

Beverages and nibbles will be served during the course of the evening. You are very welcome to bring a guest but please add their name at the registration. Please note the dress code for this event is smart casual.

Programme

17:30 - 18:15   Registration and Networking

18:15 - 19:00   Presentation of the winners of the STEM Alumni Awards 2026 by Prof Bashar Nuseibeh, Executive Dean of the School of Science & Technology

19:00 - 20:00   ‘‘Engineering a Sustainable Future: The STEM behind Net Zero’  Panel Discussion chaired by Prof Richard Curran, Professor of Aviation Management at the School of Science & Technology

20:00 - 20:20   Q&A

20:20 - 21:00   Further Networking over nibbles and drinks

About the speakers

Giancarlo Buono FRAes (MSc Air Transport Management, 2001) - Group Director for Safety and Airspace Regulation and Executive Board Member, UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA)

Giancarlo Buono completed his MSc in Air Transport Management at City in 2001. He is Group Director of Safety and Airspace Regulation and an Executive Board Member of the UK Civil Aviation Authority, a role he took up in January 2025. It covers flight operations, airworthiness, airspace, aerodromes, general aviation, space, and new technologies. Before the CAA he spent 11 years as Director Safety and Flight Operations Europe at IATA, where he sat on the EASA Management Board, the EUROCONTROL Provisional Council, the SESAR Joint Undertaking Governing Board, and the EU Network Management Board. He is a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society and a former Chairman of the EASA Stakeholder Advisory Body.

Professor Robert Wood FREng (BSc Mechanical Engineering, 1982) - Professor of Surface Engineering and Tribology, University of Southampton

Robert Wood is Professor of Surface Engineering and Tribology at the University of Southampton and completed his BSc in Mechanical Engineering at City in 1982. In 2008 he founded the national Centre for Advanced Tribology at Southampton (nCATS), which grew from 5 to 50 research staff with 25 industrial partners. As Associate Dean for Research across two faculties he oversaw research income of £60 to 65 million per year, around 800 researchers, and 1,200 PhD students. He works with more than 100 companies internationally and contributes to bodies including IMechE, IoP, IoM3, RSC, and IET. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, and a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, and the Higher Education Academy.

Dr Marco Edoardo Rosti (PhD Aeronautical Engineering, 2016) - Associate Professor, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST)

Marco Edoardo Rosti completed his PhD in Aeronautical Engineering at City in 2016. He is a tenured Associate Professor at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) in Japan, where he works in computational fluid mechanics. In the nine years since his PhD he has published 106 papers, with an h-index of 34 and more than 3,000 citations. In 2025 he received the François Frenkiel Award from the American Physical Society, together with the Andrea Prosperetti Award from the International Journal of Multiphase Flow. He also holds the RYUMON Award for Distinguished Young Researcher in Fluid Mechanics (2021) from the Japanese Society of Fluid Mechanics. In 2026 he is a visiting researcher at ETH Zurich, TU Wien, and Politecnico di Milano.

Rishi Preetam Thiruthani (MSc Cybersecurity, 2022) – Cyber Security Specialist at Craig International

Rishi Preetam Thiruthani completed his MSc in Cybersecurity at City in 2022. He is a Cybersecurity Specialist at Craig International in Aberdeen, working across offensive and defensive security. His certifications include OSEP, CREST CRT, CRTO, and OSCP, alongside Microsoft and other credentials. He has designed and implemented information security management frameworks, carried out penetration testing across infrastructure and applications, built a custom cybersecurity awareness learning management system, and integrated AI into security operations. In 2026 he won two Computing Security Excellence Awards: the Outstanding Security Researcher/Analyst Award and the Security Rising Star of the Year.

Alina Donets (BSc Business Studies, 2011) - Co-Founder and Chief Investment Officer, Zenco Bioenergy

Alina Donets, CFA, has fourteen years of front-office sustainable investment experience at Lombard Odier IM, Allianz Global Investors, and Pictet AM, where she channeled capital toward the technologies and companies driving the environmental transition. Through her career, Alina managed funds in Water, Natural Capital, Biodiversity and Food Systems, with mandates that financed sustainable infrastructure and innovation at scale.

Today, Alina is now Co-Founder and Chief Investment Officer at Zenco Bioenergy, a UK-based renewable energy company engineering seaweed-based feedstock for biogas market, and developing the first bio-energy plant accelerating transition to net zero and bio-based economy. She holds an MSc from HEC Paris, with a certificate in Energy and Finance, and a First-Class Honours BSc from Cass Business School, and is an Alumna of Harvard Business School.