Ilan Chet

Chet was born in 1939 and pursued his doctorate at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Faculty of Agriculture in Rehovot.[1] Near the completion of his Ph.D., he was called up for military service at the outbreak of the Six-Day War in 1967.[1] He sustained head injuries and lost his eyesight during the fighting; while hospitalized, he dictated his dissertation to his wife.[1]

Although Chet subsequently regained his sight, his injuries left him physically unable to use the electron microscope.[1] This limitation prompted a change in his academic direction, although he remained within molecular biology.[1] He undertook postdoctoral studies at the University of Wisconsin and later moved to Harvard University’s Department of Applied Microbiology.[1]

Chet became an associate professor at the Hebrew University’s Faculty of Agriculture in 1975 and a full professor in 1978.[1] His research focused on biological control of plant disease, using environmentally friendly microorganisms to improve plant resistance and reduce the need for pesticides.[1] His work encompassed basic, applied, and biotechnological research.[1]

In an agricultural project described in October 1983, Chet worked with Professor Yigal Henis and Mark Platt on growing oyster mushrooms in cotton straw.[4] Cotton straw was often burned or plowed back into fields; removing it could also help prevent disease and insects from being carried into subsequent plantings.[4] Explaining their interest in the material, the researchers said: “With all the money spent on irrigating cotton fields, we felt that the straw could not be allowed to go to waste.”[4]

The project sought both to grow mushrooms and to make the remaining straw usable as animal feed.[4] Lignin encased the cellulose in untreated straw, making the raw material unsuitable for feed; the oyster mushrooms degraded 60–70 percent of that lignin.[4] Chet explained that this process allowed digestive enzymes in sheep and cattle to reach the cellulose.[4]

The team selected oyster mushrooms because they were relatively easy to grow and tolerated Israeli temperature fluctuations.[4] By comparison, champignon mushrooms required costly air conditioning and prepared compost.[4] The process involved soaking the straw for two days, steaming it to eliminate competing organisms, and then sowing it with mushrooms.[4] Under summer conditions, the reported yield after three weeks was 700 grams of mushrooms per kilogram of cotton straw.[4]

Tests in sheep stomachs indicated that the treated straw was digestible, and the researchers found that animals would eat it.[4] Weight-gain trials were still in progress in 1983.[4] Chet and Platt estimated that the straw might have approximately half the food value of grain and suggested that its use could save about 150,000 tons of animal feed annually; these were estimates rather than documented later outcomes.[4]

Alongside his research, Chet held a succession of leadership positions at the Hebrew University.[1] He founded the Otto Warburg Center of Biotechnology in Agriculture in Rehovot and directed it during 1983–1986 and 1990–1992.[1] He served as dean of the Faculty of Agriculture from 1986 to 1989 and as the university’s vice president for research and development from 1992 to 2001.[1]

His professional activities also extended beyond Israeli universities.[1] He worked as a senior scientist at DuPont in Delaware, served on scientific advisory committees of the European Union and NATO, and spent ten years as a member of the United Nations Panel for Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology.[1] He joined the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities in 1998 and became president of the Weizmann Institute of Science in December 2001.[1]

Chet participated in several initiatives linking academic research with biotechnology development.[5][6] Entrepreneur Rafi Hofstein credited Chet’s advice with changing the direction of his career: Chet suggested agricultural biotechnology, after which Hofstein worked with colleagues from human genetic engineering on biological-control projects aimed at improving plant resistance to pests.[5] In 2005, Chet was among the Israeli life-sciences figures recruited to the advisory board of the life-sciences fund alseT IP.[6]

As Weizmann president, Chet contributed to a report on the Israeli biotechnology industry submitted to the government’s Chief Scientist in 2007.[7] The report assessed the industry’s condition and recommended measures for its development.[7] By 2008, he was a member of the task force for Galil Biotech, a program concerned with biotechnology development in the Upper Galilee and Kiryat Shmona.[2] Other members included Teva chairman Eli Hurvitz and former finance minister Avraham Shochat; the task force met every six months to discuss advancing the program.[2]

A 2010 company profile identified Chet and Dr. Ofer Kleinfeld as the founders of My Control, a company developing biological-control preparations for soil-borne plant diseases.[8] Its product released spores active at plant roots to protect against disease.[8] At the time of that profile, the company had four employees and had raised $500,000.[8]

Chet also supported research addressing energy and environmental health.[9][10] In 2006, while president of the Weizmann Institute, he presented its planned Initiative for Research in Sustainable and Alternative Energy as a response to the energy crisis.[9] He argued that sustainable energy at the necessary scale would require knowledge enabling entirely new technologies and that the institute had an obligation to help lead the global effort.[9]

By 2018, Chet was chairman of the Environment and Health Fund.[10] At its tenth annual meeting, he said the fund had contributed several tens of millions of dollars to public-health and environmental research over the years.[10] He described support for centers at the Hebrew University and the Technion, researcher positions, and visits by foreign experts to conferences.[10]

From 2010 to 2016, Chet served on Israel’s behalf as the Union for the Mediterranean’s deputy secretary general for higher education and research.[3] The appointment followed an agreement reached when the organization was founded in 2008: Israel and Arab countries accepted an Israeli deputy secretary general in exchange for granting the Arab League observer status.[3] Within the organization, Chet worked alongside a Moroccan director general and a Palestinian deputy secretary general responsible for environment and water.[11]

A principal educational project associated with Chet’s tenure was the Euromed University of Fes in Morocco, intended to educate young people who could contribute to Mediterranean integration and development.[3] Its founding was approved in 2012, and it opened in 2014 with 2,000 students from various countries.[3] Its development plan envisaged capacity for 7,000 students and 650 staff by 2024.[3]

Chet also led the Eastern Mediterranean International School and Foundation project in Israel, known as EMIS.[3] The project received a Union for the Mediterranean label and €11.8 million in Israeli government and European funding in 2016.[3] Located in Hakfar Hayarok, the school granted international matriculation certificates and was reported to have 190 students in grades 10–12, of whom 20 percent came from Arab countries.[3] Classes were conducted in English, with Hebrew and Arabic studied as second languages.[3]

After Chet left his Union for the Mediterranean position in 2016, Israel did not appoint a replacement representative at the organization’s Barcelona headquarters.[3] Instead, it managed the relationship through the Foreign Ministry’s Department for Multilateral European Organizations.[3] The decision reflected an assessment that the benefits of a permanent representative did not justify the expense and that participation in periodic meetings by ministers, diplomats, and professional staff was sufficient.[3]

Chet received the Israel Prize in 1996, the Wolf Prize in 1998, and the EMET Prize in 2003.[1] He and Baldur R. Stefansson were the 1998 Wolf Prize recipients in Agriculture, recognized for contributions to the environmentally safe development of world agriculture through innovative approaches in breeding and biological control.[12]

His scientific record included more than 340 articles in international journals, four edited books, 33 patents, and two marketed products based on his research.[1] His involvement in commercial biological-control preparations connected his scientific work with agricultural application.[8]

Within the Union for the Mediterranean, recollections of Chet’s tenure were positive, particularly because of his contribution to establishing the university in Morocco and his interpersonal relationships with colleagues from elsewhere in the region.[3] Officials also viewed Israel as a constructive participant in the organization.[3]

As president of the Weizmann Institute, Chet opposed calls for an academic boycott of Israel.[13] During debate over the 2005 boycott motions and an April 2004 Palestinian academic and cultural boycott call, he responded: “The Israeli academy is not involved in the occupation and politics. We’ve worked with Palestinian academics.”[13] The statement expressed his position in the boycott debate rather than an independently established assessment of Israeli academia’s relationship with politics.[13]