>
Quarks to the Cosmos
 |
Quarks to the Cosmos
Speaker biographies
|
-
Tim Bedding
Professor Tim Bedding works on asteroseismology, the study of
stellar oscillations. He has worked in the School of Physics at
the University of Sydney since 1995 and was Head of School from
2012 to 2018.
-
Tara Murphy
Professor Tara Murphy is an astrophysicist working at the
University of Sydney, and an Australian Research Council Future
Fellow. She has a Bachelor of Science from the University of
Sydney and a PhD in astrophysics from the University of
Edinburgh. Tara leads an international team of researchers
trying to detect and study transient and highly variable
astrophysical phenomena with the MWA and ASKAP radio telescopes
in Western Australia. In 2017 her team detected the first radio
emission from a gravitational wave event caused by the merger
of two neutron stars. Tara is also passionate about teaching
and public outreach. In 2014 she co-founded a start-up company,
Grok Learning, to get high school students around the world
excited about computational thinking.
-
Barnaby Norris
Dr Barnaby Norris is Instrument Scientist for AAO-USyd and a
Research Fellow at the University of Sydney. He specialises in
high-angular resolution imaging, including infrared imaging
cameras, adaptive optics (especially machine learning) and
interferometry. A particular interest is astro-photonic
technologies. He led the design and construction of the
VAMPIRES polarimetric imager and interferometer and the GLINT
nulling interferometer, both deployed at the 8 m Subaru
Telescope in Hawaii. Astronomical research interests focus on
planet formation and mass-loss from evolved stars, performed
both with custom-built instruments and existing facility
instruments.
-
Shelley Wickham
Dr Shelley Wickham is a DECRA Fellow, Westpac Research Fellow
and Lecturer in the Schools of Physics and Chemistry at the
University of Sydney.
She earned her BSc in Physics at the University of Sydney,
working on photonic structures found in biology. She received
her PhD in Condensed Matter Physics from the University of
Oxford working on building synthetic molecular motors out of
DNA. She then moved to a postdoc position at Harvard Medical
School and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired
Engineering, where she worked on designing 3-dimensional DNA
origami nanostructures, and using them to study biological
systems.
Dr Wickham has research interests in self-assembling
nanotechnology molecular robotics, and microfluidics. In
particular, in the design and assembly of programmable
nanostructures out of DNA, with applications in cell biology,
materials science and nanomedicine. She is co-lead of the
Sydney Nano Institute Grand Challenge project in Molecular
Nanorobotics for Health.
-
Arne Grimsmo
Dr Arne Grimsmo works on the theory of quantum mechanics and
its application to technology. He did a PhD in Physics in
Norway and subsequently worked as a scientist in Canada for
several years, before joining The University of Sydney as a
Lecturer.
-
Jesse van de Sande
Jesse van de Sande is a Research Fellow at the University
of Sydney studying how galaxies form and evolve. He tries to
solve the big questions such as 'How was the Milky Way Galaxy
formed?' and 'What will happen to our Milky Way after it
collides with the Andromeda Galaxy?' Jesse uses the Anglo
Australian Telescope with an instrument called SAMI to study
the motions of stars within galaxies. For his PhD thesis, he
used the Hubble Space Telescope and the Very Large Telescopes
in Chilli to investigate the formation and evolution of massive
galaxies in the early Universe.
-
Joss Bland Hawthorn
Joss Bland-Hawthorn is an ARC Laureate Professor of
Astrophysics at the University of Sydney. He is Director of the
Sydney Institute for Astronomy and has won many awards. These
include the 2018 Miller Professorship to Berkeley and the
biennial 2017 Thomas Ranken Lyle medal from the Australian
Academy of Science, the first astronomer to win this award in
over 40 years. Two weeks ago, The Australian identified Joss as
one of the country's Stars in Research and the overall leader
in the field of astronomy and astrophysics. With Ken Freeman
(ANU), he has developed the field of galactic archaeology over
the past 20 years. In 2000, Joss also initiated the field of
astrophotonics that brings together photonics into astronomical
and space instrumentation. In 2012, Joss was elected to the
Australian Academy of Science.
-
Kevin Varvell
Kevin Varvell obtained his undergraduate degree from the
University of Western Australia and his D.Phil from the
University of Oxford. From there he held post-doctoral
positions at the University of Birmingham, UK, and at ANSTO. He
was an ARC Senior Research Fellow at the University of Sydney
from 1997 to 2001, and held further research-only positions
there until 2005 when he switched to a teaching and research
position. In recent years he has been the Director of the
University of Sydney Node of the ARC Centre of Excellence for
Particle Physics at the Terascale. Kevin's research interests
lie in experimental particle physics. Over his career he has
worked on six international experiments based at CERN, Fermilab
and KEK, embracing neutrino physics, flavour physics with
B-mesons, and hadron collider physics. His current research
interests are primarily focused on rare leptonic and
semi-leptonic decays of B-mesons; understanding the properties
of the recently discovered Higgs boson; and searching for new
physics beyond the Standard Model using the ATLAS experiment at
CERN's LHC and the Belle and Belle II experiments at KEK in
Japan.
-
Tristram Alexander
Dr Tristram Alexander is a Senior Lecturer in the School of
Physics, based in the Institute for Photonics and Optical
Science. His work spans a wide range of problems in nonlinear
physics, from light self-localisation (solitons) in optical
waveguides, to thermal energy localisation (breathers) in
phononics. He also applies the tools of nonlinear physics to
problems in social dynamics, using social media data to guide
models of opinion dynamics and political polarization.
Last updated 21 November 2019
Please let me know of any problems with these pages: helenj@physics.usyd.edu.au