Photo caption: (left to right) Professor Paul Millar, Professor Andy Nicol and Professor Natalia Chaban.
Three UC researchers have been selected as 2026 Fellows of the Royal Society Te Apārangi, recognising the international impact and excellence of their work.
Professors Natalia Chaban, Paul Millar and Andy Nicol from Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha | University of Canterbury (UC) have been selected for their outstanding contributions across international relations, humanities and geoscience. Their induction into the Academy will take place on 30 April in Wellington.
This honour recognises scholars whose work has achieved the highest levels of distinction globally, reinforcing UC's strength across diverse research disciplines.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research & Innovation | Tumu Tuarua Rangahau Professor Lucy Johnston says the recognition reflects both individual excellence and UC's broader research impact.
"The election of our academics as Fellows of the Royal Society Te Apārangi reflects the real-world difference our researchers are making," Professor Johnston says.
"From global diplomacy to cultural heritage and natural hazard resilience, their work is helping shape a better future."
"We're incredibly proud to see their contributions recognised at the highest national level."
The 2026 new UC Fellows are:
Professor Natalia Chaban
Professor Chaban is recognised internationally as an expert on political communication in international relations and public diplomacy. She is regarded as a founding expert and world leader among researchers who have systematically studied global perceptions of the European Union and narratives about its foreign policy, challenging its Eurocentric understanding. An original thinker, she co-developed the theorisation of the "perceptual approach" to foreign policy, which has advanced understanding of the role of perceptions in international relations, diplomacy, and foreign policy formulation. Her interdisciplinary background in international strategic communication informs her research, including her recent work to apply critical scholarship to understanding the war against Ukraine. Her findings, which include analyses of crisis, youth, cultural, and heritage aspects of public diplomacy, have been taken up by policymakers, civil society, and diplomats in Aotearoa New Zealand and around the world.
Professor Paul Millar
Professor Millar is a Professor of English literature and digital humanities. He is an expert on the New Zealand poet and playwright James K Baxter. His works on Baxter include formerly unpublished letters that the poet wrote in his youth to Noel Ginn, which included the text of 255 poems. In the new field of digital humanities, which allows open access to literary texts online, Paul promoted teaching the discipline and has established nationally significant archives. These include the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre and the CEISMIC Canterbury Earthquake Digital Archive (now part of the University of Canterbury's Art Lab). He has championed post-disaster humanities research and served as president of the Australasian Association for Digital Humanities.
Professor Andy Nicol
Professor Nicol is a geologist and internationally recognised expert in tectonic faults and geohazards. He has used data from Aotearoa New Zealand, supported by sites across the world, to research the geometry, scaling relationships, displacement rates, interactions, and growth of active faults. He has also studied the New Zealand plate boundary over long timeframes. Much of Professor Nicol's research is important to hazard assessment in New Zealand. He has shaped the understanding of the 2016 M7.8 Kaikōura earthquake and contributed to two editions of the National Seismic Hazard Model. Outside of tectonics, Professor Nicol has applied his expertise to carbon dioxide and hydrogen storage.
