FOUNDER AND OWNER
I - Angelina Souren - established SmarterScience in Amsterdam in 1997, and relocated to the United Kingdom at the end of 2004.
Like any other business, SmarterScience has had its ups and downs.
Since my move to the UK, telecommunication problems plague me in an unpredictable manner. This do with the problems BT hardware has with routing various signals. At one time, there were also errors that cascaded down multiple databases at several organizations; among other things it meant that my street address officially no longer existed. Electricity hiccups are common in the UK too, albeit not at my current premises.
Someone explained to me that most of this has to do with the industrial revolution having started so early here. Overhauling the UK's entire old infrastructure would take a huge fortune and practical considerations make it impossible. Instead, new systems are being created, that step by step start replace the old infrastructure where possible.
That's me there on the right - with Dutch environmental chemistry colleagues
At the start, I modeled my business on the great diversity and the large number of tasks university scientists have.
The inspiration came from a chemist at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. I was chatting with him about a review I had just published and then he sighed and said that he wished he still had enough time to keep up with all the literature.
One of the things I did for my colleagues in academia was carry out those literature studies for them, for example as a preparation for papers or research proposals they wanted tot write, or simply for the teaching materials they handed out to
their students. I also started providing scientific editing services, which saved them a great
deal of time and made it easier for them to get published.
The corporate world, however, soon started discovering me as well. In the web's early days, it was still very easy for entrepreneurs and company scientists in the States to find my business web site.
The initial name of my business was Armadillo Research Services.
That partly explains the logo SmarterScience used for more than 13 years, which was a nine-banded armadillo.
The nine-banded armadillo
is a unique animal, as well as a very fast swimmer and a remarkable survivor in challenging conditions,
in which it tends to expand its territory whereas other mammals retreat. How inspiring!
In the second half of 2010, I designed a new logo. It is more dynamic, and hints at my initials as
well as at the business name and the internet. It was time for a change, signifying an increasing emphasis on strategy consultancy and creativity.
Yes, I am also the author of that widely used review on the environmental and analytical
chemistry of cyanide published in the
newsletter of the Geochemical Society and yes, I wrote that article about the history of geochemistry, too.
I have been writing for all sorts of audiences for a long time. More recently, I wrote numerous items for the Geochemical Society and I wrote about
environmental chemistry for the members of the Environmental Chemistry Section or the Royal
Netherlands Chemical Society and their colleagues in toxicology and
geochemistry.
I wrote for civil and environmental engineers all over the world, and I also wrote that
hilarious essay on the year 2000 which made lots of laughter bubble up
in my grade-school class, and sort of ran the school paper for a while.
The person who provided zoos, private persons and others all over the world with information about armadillos and
even offered a recipe for what to put in the bottle to feed pups? Yep, that too.
This is me on geological fieldwork in Sweden, in a boat between the harbor of Loftahammar and a small uninhabited island called Ekö, in the Baltic Sea.
I am always grateful to have the
assistance of colleagues and friends on the continent and in the US. Below are examples of partners I
cooperate with.
Hoeflaken Geoconsultants
Drs. Frans van Hoeflaken - sedimentologist and stratigrapher with extensive experience in exploratory and
preparatory fieldwork, particularly in Asia.
I met Frans during a geological fieldwork in Spain in the summer of 1986 and we've stayed in touch since then.
Frans is dedicated, skilled, resourceful and wonderful to work with. Nothing wrong with his sense of humor
either, by the way. Frans is based in Amsterdam. I contacted Frans
for instance when a geologist from an oil
country in the Middle East wanted to talk about fieldwork, and writing it all up for oil companies and scientific journals.
Frans stems from a family of earth scientists and has just spent two years in
Papua New Guinea,
where he worked as a field geologist for the EU.
Krivaja Translations
Dr. Ir. Marianne Kerkhof - mathematician and technical physicist with teaching experience in
computer science and specialized in translations in these fields
Marianne and I have been members of
NIMF, a large Dutch network for women in science
for many years. We have cooperated numerous times and refer to each other's businesses whenever appropriate.
Marianne is the person you need to talk to if for example
you need a translation of a mathematics book or a bulky SAP manual from English into Dutch.
I also keep a list with various of my activities
online, as it enables people to
find me if they happened to forget my name, but remember me from a workshop or other event.
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