2026 Archives

Dr Matt Oldakowski

Dr Matt Oldakowski is a biomedical engineer who works with doctors to identify important clinical problems where existing treatments are invasive, difficult to use or simply not good enough.

Matt’s work currently focuses on two major healthcare challenges. The first is young children with glue ear, where fluid trapped behind the eardrum can cause hearing loss and may eventually require surgery. The second is older people with fragile bones, where the screws used to repair fractures can sometimes lose their grip in weak bone.

Although these problems are very different, his approach is the same: understand the problem from the perspective of patients and clinicians, then use engineering and science to develop a better solution. Dr Oldakowski has invented and developed two medical technologies designed to address these problems.

Earflo is a new treatment for children with glue ear that uses a simple “sippy-cup” style device to gently deliver air through the nose while a child swallows, helping the ears clear naturally at home. The technology has progressed from an idea developed through Stanford Biodesign to four clinical studies, including work with Aboriginal children in the remote Pilbara region of Western Australia, before moving through manufacturing, regulatory approval and market launch. Earflo has now been used by hundreds of patients, with the aim of helping children restore their hearing and avoid surgery.

Matt’s other major area of research grew from his PhD, where he invented an expandable surgical screw. Instead of relying on a conventional screw to grip weak bone, the implant expands after insertion to create stronger fixation. This technology is now being developed by REX Ortho for applications including hip fractures and spinal surgery. We have ethics approval to begin our first-in-human clinical study, which will use advanced imaging techniques to precisely measure how well the implant performs after surgery.

Across both projects, Matt’s research focuses on taking scientific and engineering discoveries beyond the laboratory and developing them into technologies that can ultimately improve patients’ lives.

Samantha Lynch

Australians rely on healthy waterways for recreation, food, culture, biodiversity and local economies. Yet an almost invisible form of pollution—microplastics—is now present throughout our aquatic environments. Until recently, governments and communities lacked the evidence needed to understand where contamination was greatest and where action should begin.

Environmental scientist, Sam Lynch is making invisible pollution visible. Sam initiated and led Australia’s first statewide Broadscale Microplastic Assessment, collecting 600 samples from 120 estuaries across New South Wales. Her research found microplastics in every waterway sampled, with the highest concentrations occurring in urbanised catchments.

Sam transformed these complex scientific findings into a publicly accessible heat map, enabling communities, councils and decision-makers to understand conditions in their local waterways and prioritise action. Her research is informing government policy, regulatory responses, and industry initiatives designed to prevent plastic pollution at its source.

Through national media, community events, and direct engagement with councils, government agencies, and industry, Sam has brought microplastic science to more than two million Australians. She is now tracing microplastics back to their sources so interventions and regulation can be targeted before pollution reaches our waterways. By showing us where the problem is, and where it begins, Sam’s science is helping Australia move from awareness to prevention.

Dr Jessica Buck

Unfortunately, First Nations kids with cancer have poor survival rates, and we don’t know why. Beyond the basic statistics of how many First Nations kids get cancer, and how many survive, we really don’t know much at all. We don’t know what types of cancer they get, the genetics of their cancer, what treatments might work best, or how we can make sure First Nations kids, families and communities can have the best possible experience in hospital. We also don’t know what First Nations communities want us to research about childhood cancer.

Dr Buck’s research aims to improve outcomes for First Nations kids with cancer. She is developing a culturally safe, community-led program of research that will answer the questions that kids and their families want answered. These questions include how we can improve survival of childhood cancer, what influence does genetics have, and how we can best support kids to thrive after cancer. Importantly, Dr Buck and her team are also developing guidelines for how samples from First Nations peoples can be used in medical research in a culturally safe way.

Dr Lucy Gloag

Dr Lucy Gloag works to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels requires clean energy technologies that are efficient, affordable, and practical at scale. These technologies depend on catalysts to speed up chemical reactions, but current catalyst materials can be expensive, energy-intensive, and inefficient.

Dr Lucy Gloag’s research focuses on creating tiny materials called nanoparticles that act as highly efficient catalysts for clean energy technologies. Her team builds these nanoparticles with atomic-level precision, controlling how individual atoms are arranged to develop materials that use less energy, last longer, and rely on cheaper and more abundant elements.

Her research is helping pave the way for cleaner fuels, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and a future where sustainable energy technologies can more effectively replace fossil fuels.

Dr Sima Mousavi

Australia is often considered geologically quiet but earthquakes occur here regularly, and many of the faults responsible are hidden underground and unmapped. The 2021 Woods Point earthquake in Victoria is a perfect example; the fault was 130 kilometres from Melbourne CBD, yet the damage was felt across the city. Dr Sima Mousavi studies these hidden earthquake sources, working to understand where they are, how they rupture, and what risks they pose to Australian communities and infrastructure.

But Dr Mousavi believes that understanding the Earth is only half the job. As the lead of the Australian Seismometers in Schools (AuSIS) program, she places real research-grade seismometers in schools across the country, connecting students directly with live earthquake data. From suburban classrooms to remote and First Nations communities that mainstream science rarely reaches, she brings real earthquake science to students who might never otherwise encounter a working scientist.

This outreach mission is urgent because Australia faces a critical shortage of Earth scientists at exactly the moment demand is rising. Geoscientists are needed for the energy transition, critical minerals discovery, natural hazard assessment, and groundwater management. Dr Mousavi’s work addresses both sides of this challenge: advancing our scientific understanding of earthquake hazard, and inspiring the next generation of Australians to become the Earth scientists our country urgently needs.

Dr Mousavi’s research focuses on characterising earthquakes and the faults that produce them across Australia. She led the first comprehensive source characterisation of the 2021 Mw 5.9 Woods Point earthquake in Victoria, identifying the previously unknown fault responsible and showing that hidden structures can pose real seismic hazard in regions long considered safe. She is currently extending this work to the 2019 Mw 6.6 Broome offshore earthquake and the 2025 Brisbane sequence, building a clearer picture of earthquake risk across the continent. She has also contributed to a new high-resolution seismic catalogue for southwestern Australia, improving detection of smaller earthquakes where historical records are sparse.

To address Australia’s growing geoscience workforce crisis, Dr Mousavi leads the Australian Seismometers in Schools (AuSIS) program, connecting students across the country with real earthquake data from research-grade instruments in their own classrooms. Since 2019 she has delivered over 250 workshops and teacher professional development sessions nationwide, with deliberate focus on regional, remote, and First Nations communities. She has secured dedicated funding to embed seismometers within Aboriginal communities across APY Lands, Horn Island, Oak Valley, Yalata, Yulara, and Nhulunbuy, building genuine, long-term partnerships with Country.

A/Prof Melanie Baak

Schools should be places where all young people can learn, participate and develop a strong sense of belonging. Yet for many students, particularly those from culturally and racially diverse backgrounds, experiences of exclusion, racism and inequitable educational practices continue to shape what they learn, how they experience school, and the opportunities available to them. These experiences can diminish students’ engagement, achievement and aspirations, while limiting their capacity to participate fully in school and society.

Melanie’s research works directly with young people, educators, schools and policymakers to create more inclusive and equitable education systems. Through more than 15 externally funded research projects, she has translated the experiences of culturally and racially diverse students into practical strategies that strengthen school belonging, improve teaching, and inform education policy. Her research has contributed to teacher professional learning, anti-racism initiatives and policies across South Australia and nationally, while supporting schools to better meet the needs of refugee, migrant and other racially marginalised students. By bringing together research, policy and practice, Melanie ensures that evidence leads to meaningful change in classrooms, helping educators create learning environments where all students feel valued, included and able to succeed.

Dr Scarlett Howard

Many people are aware that bees are essential to pollination, which contributes to healthy ecosystems and food security. However, the intelligence of bees and other insect pollinators has been classically overlooked. Understanding the intelligence and behaviour of insects has applications to creating bio-inspired technology, enhancing pollination, unravelling the evolution of intelligence, and conserving pollinators.

Dr Scarlett Howard studies the intelligence of the miniature brains of bees, with bees as voluntary collaborators. Dr Howard has discovered that honeybees possess an understanding of the concept of zero, can perform addition and subtraction, learn to categorise quantities as odd or even, and can even acquire a basic symbolic number language, akin to Arabic numerals. She is currently examining how environmental change is impacting pollinator intelligence, behaviour, and pollination capacity. Her research into the numerical abilities of bees is ongoing, as she explores the applications of bee intelligence to bio-inspired technology. Dr Howard is an avid science communicator, writing for popular news outlets, co-hosting a radio show, conducting public lectures, appearing on TV, radio, and podcasts, and participating in community events to raise awareness of insect conservation and value.

Dr Kit Prendergast

Native bees and pollinators are declining across the globe, including in Australia, where we are facing a crisis in native bee conservation. Native bees are crucial components of Australia’s biodiversity – there are over 1,700 described species, with an estimated 400+ that are not even described yet! Through their roles as pollinators, they contribute to the flourishing of ecosystems, and their pollination services to wildflowers underpin sustainable and resilient ecological landscapes. Yet native bees face many pressures, including a lack of public awareness.

Dr Kit Prendergast’s research has brought native bees, their plight, and evidence-based ways to conserve them into the spotlight. Her research on native bees in urbanised landscapes has identified key habitat considerations to ensure the preservation of native bees in the places where most people live, work and play. I have identified important flora for native bees, helping local councils, gardeners and landcare groups understand their local native bee assemblages and provide targeted plantings and habitat enhancements. Kit’s research has identified optimal bee hotel design, and provided a world-first demonstration that bee hotels can be used as bushfire recovery tools. She has also developed a framework on designing seed production areas to support pollinators, ensuring quality seed production and biodiverse landscapes. Through my science communication, I have brought native bees into the limelight, including through an award-winning circus science comedy The Birds & the Bees. In addition, Kit has also advanced the taxonomy of native bees, and have described two new species. Her contributions to the science of native bees include 80 peer-reviewed publications, as well as a plethora of content for diverse stakeholders, from children, to farmers, environmental organisations, and research institutions.

Dr Jarmon Lees

Heart disease is one of the biggest killers in Australia, but for people living with conditions like Friedreich ataxia or diabetes, the situation is even more stark: there are no effective treatments for the heart complications that will eventually cut their lives short. Part of the reason progress has been slow is that most research relies on animal models or oversimplified lab experiments that do not behave the way the human heart actually does. Better models mean better science, and better science means better treatments.

Dr Lees grows tiny beating pieces of human heart tissue in the laboratory, made from stem cells donated by people living with the diseases he studies. These “mini-hearts” let his team watch disease unfold up close and test potential new medicines directly on human tissue.

His lab currently uses this approach to study Friedreich ataxia, a devastating inherited condition that robs young people of their mobility and their heart function, as well as diabetic heart disease. A newer program is growing heart and kidney tissue together in the same dish, mimicking the way these two organs affect each other when diabetes takes hold.

For Friedreich ataxia specifically, his team is pursuing several therapeutic strategies in parallel: developing mRNA-based therapies targeting the molecular drivers of the disease, investigating whether restoring protective fats that are depleted in affected heart cells can improve heart function, and contributing to a collaboration screening over 1,000 existing approved medicines to identify candidates that could be repurposed to treat the condition.

A/Prof Mary Woessner

A/Prof May Woessner

More than four million Australian children participate in community sport every week. However, research shows that many children experience psychological, physical, or sexual harm while participating in community sport. Preventing abuse is particularly challenging in sport because responsibility for child safety is spread across a complex network of governments, sporting organisations, clubs, and volunteers. Community clubs are often expected to implement safeguarding policies with limited training, resources, or support, leaving volunteers to navigate situations largely on their own. As a result, there is often a gap between child safety policies on paper and the realities of keeping children safe in practice. Understanding how to close this gap and promote sporting environments that are safe and inclusive for all participants is one of the most significant challenges facing Australian community sport today.

A/Prof Mary Woessner is an ARC DECRA Fellow at Victoria University, where she leads the Safe and Inclusive Sport Research Group. Her work is driven by a commitment to promoting safe, equitable, and inclusive cultures in sport, with particular attention the community sport settings. Her research examines how policy, governance, and community practices shape safety and wellbeing in sport. She has led landmark research on the prevalence of psychological, physical, and sexual violence in Australian community sport, children’s experiences of disclosing abuse and how adults respond, and the support needs of volunteers responsible for safeguarding. Collectively, her work informs policy, training, and practice nationally and internationally. She remains committed to translating evidence into practical strategies that improve prevention, reporting, and response systems within community sport.