Welcome to UCD Alumni

David E Freeman is a class of 1972 MVB graduate. He specialises in equine surgery and has a worldwide reputation in his field with countless awards that demonstrate the global impacts of his research. David is the first UCD graduate to become board-certified in the prestigious American College of Veterinary Surgeons (ACVS) and the first to earn the prestigious ACVS Founders' Award for Career Achievement. He also acts as a mentor to others in his field, and their successes are a great source of pride to him.

Simon Steel received his Ph.D. in astrophysics from UCD, studying the star formation histories of blue compact dwarf galaxies. He is currently Deputy Director of the Carl Sagan Center for Research at the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute located in Mountain View, California, and heads the Institute’s education and public engagement programmes. Originally from London and a lifelong supporter of Tottenham Hotspur FC, Simon came to Ireland in 1991 and divided his work life between Belfield and the Canary Islands, and spent leisure time in Marlay Park with his two Dublin-born children, Conor and Aisling. 

Professor Peter William Halligan is an internationally renowned psychologist and neuroscientist whose research covers a range of different neurological and psychiatric conditions including attentional disorders, motor conversion, the nature of beliefs, delusions, neuroplasticity and phantom limb phenomena, hypnosis and consciousness. Born in Dublin, Peter is the second eldest of six children, five of whom are graduates of UCD. In 1997, he joined the Department of Experimental Psychology at Oxford as an MRC Senior Research Fellow and in 2000, he joined Cardiff University as Distinguished Research Professor in Neuropsychology. This year he received an honorary CBE from King Charles III for services to neuropsychology research and science in government.