Glittering prizes

Chris Patten, former governor of Hong Kong and now European Commissioner for external relations, will receive an honorary degree of doctor of civil law when he is installed as chancellor of the University of Newcastle next week.

The university will also award honorary degrees to: Raymond Seitz, former US ambassador to the UK and vice-chairman of investment bank Lehman Brothers (DCL); Roderick Macfarquhar, chairman of the department of government at Harvard University (DLitt); and Jessica Rawson, warden of Merton College, Oxford (DLitt).

The Queen's University of Belfast has awarded honorary doctorates of science to Harold Varmus, director of the United States's National Institutes of Health, and Richard Klausner, director of the National Cancer Institute, Washington, for their contributions to cancer research.

Peter Newmark, lecturer and author on translation, has been presented with a Liber Amicorum, a book from his friends, by the Centre for Translation Studies, University of Surrey, and scholars in the field of translation from around the world.