Royal Society of NSW News & Events

   Lecture 1

   “A Tasmanian convict who went from
     an Irish rebel to become a Governor”

   given by Thomas Keneally AO DistFRSN

Friday 22 June 2018
Mitchell Theatre, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt St, Sydney

The Royal Society of NSW and the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts — the two oldest institutions in NSW dedicated to education — are proud to present a collaborative lecture program, Great Australians You’ve Never Heard Of.

Following the success of the Enlightenment series, ‘Great Australians You’ve Never Heard Of' follows the underpinning Enlightenment idea that “the freedom to use your own intelligence” enabled remarkable people to create the extraordinary society we live in. Yet few of those special people are recognized today, nor is the context of their contributions understood by the beneficiaries of their initiatives. Over the course of four lectures, this series sets about identifying some of those people.

Other lectures in the series:

23 July 2018 — Peter Baume DistFRSN
6 September 2018 — Emeritus Professor D. Brynn Hibbert AM FRSN
12 November 2018 — Alison Bashford FRSN

   Guests of honour:

   His Excellency General The Honourable David
   Hurley AC DSC (ret’d.), Governor of New South
   Wales and Patron of the Royal Society of New
   South Wales, and Mrs Hurley

   Distinguished Fellow’s Lecture

   Thomas Keneally AO DistFRSN

   “Mungo Man imagined:
    writing the ultimate historical novel”

Friday 18 May 2018
Mitchell Galleries, State Library of NSW, Shakespeare Place, Sydney

Award of Medals:

Clarke Medal for the natural sciences: 
   Professor David Keith

Edgeworth David Medal for distinguished research by a young scientist:
   Associate Professor  Angela Nickerson

James Cook Medal for contributions to science and human welfare:
   Professor Gordon Parker

History & Philosophy of Science Medal: 
   Professor Peter Godfrey-Smith

Pollock Memorial Lectureship:
   Professor Andrea Morello

Poggendorff Award for plant biology and agriculture:
   Associate Professor Brent Kaiser

Royal Society of NSW Medal:
   Dr Donald Hector

   “Engineering for understanding:
   how building quantum devices unveils
   the meaning of quantum mechanics”
   
   Professor Andrea Morello
   Professor of Quantum Engineering
   UNSW Sydney

Wednesday 2 May 2018
Club Bar, Roundhouse, UNSW Sydney, Kensington

The Pollock Memorial Lectureship is awarded for research in physics.  It is jointly sponsored by the University of Sydney and the Royal Society of NSW in memory of Professor J.A. Pollock, Professor of Physics at the University of Sydney (1899-1922) and a member of the Royal Society of NSW for 35 years.

Over a century after the establishment of quantum mechanics, the popular – and sometimes even the professional – literature is still permeated by the myth that quantum mechanics is weird and no one understands it. Yet the 21st century will probably go into history as the era of quantum engineering, when the peculiar effects allowed by quantum physics were first harnessed to create unprecedented functionalities.  In this lecture, Professor Morello explanied and illustrated how the ambitious project of building a quantum computer can help us gain intimacy with the quantum world and, with it, deepen our conceptual and practical understanding of it.

Andrea Morello is a Professor of Quantum Engineering at UNSW Sydney and a Program Manager in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation & Communication Technology. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of NSW, and a Fellow of the American Physical Society. He grew up near Torino and graduated from the Politecnico di Torino in 1998. He then completed his PhD in the birthplace of low-temperature physics, the Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratorium in Leiden, Netherlands, followed by a postdoc at UBC in Vancouver. He joined UNSW in late 2006. He and his team were the first in the world to demonstrate the operation of a single-electron and a single-nucleus quantum bit in silicon. They still hold the record for quantum memory time, and the most accurate demonstration of quantum entanglement in the solid state. For these achievements, Andrea was awarded a Eureka Prize (2011), the Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year (2013), the David Syme Research Prize (2013), and the NSW Science & Engineering Award (2014), and he was the inaugural winner of the R. Landauer & C.H. Bennett Award for Quantum Computing (2017).

The lecture recording is now available to watch on YouTube, whilst a news story and gallery is available on the UNSW Engineering website.

  “Big science - exploring the future of the world’s
  most exciting STEM challenges and developments”

  Professor Richard Garrett
  Manager, Industry and External Engagement
  Australian Nuclear Science and Technology
  Organisation

Tuesday 26 June 2018
ANSTO Discovery Centre, New Illawarra Road Lucas Heights

Presented by the Australian Institute of Physics, NSW Branch, the Royal Society of NSW, the Royal Australian Chemical Institute, and the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation

  “Exciting materials for energy
    applications in 2050”
 
  Professor Robin Grimes
  Professor of Materials Physics,
  Imperial College London,
  and Chief Scientific Advisor,
  UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Wednesday 14 March 2018
UNSW Colombo Theatre

Professor Grimes’ talk focused on exciting developments in materials for energy applications and how they will improve the reliability, safety and economics of future energy systems.

Professor Grimes is Professor of Materials Physics at University College London. He has been Director of the Imperial Centre for Nuclear Engineering at Imperial College, London, since 2008 and became Director of the Imperial College Rolls Royce University Technology Centre in Nuclear Engineering in 2010. His research is focused on the use of high performance computing techniques to understand the behaviour of materials for energy applications including nuclear fission and fusion, fuel cells, batteries and solar cells. He is also Principal Investigator of the Research Council’s UK Nuclear Fission consortium project. In 2013 he was appointed the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Chief Scientific Advisor responsible for providing advice to the Foreign Secretary, Ministers and officials on science, technology and innovation.

  “The decarbonisation of industry”

  Professor Paul Fennell
  Professor of Clean Energy
  Imperial College London

The evening began with the AGM, at which there was an election of Council members

Wednesday 4 April 2018
Union, University & Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

In order to meet the IPCC recommendation for an 80% cut in CO₂ emissions by 2050, industries will be required to drastically reduce their emissions. To meet these targets, technologies such as carbon capture and storage (CCS) must be part of the economic set of decarbonisation options for industry. Options for decarbonising four of the largest industrial sectors (the iron and steel industry, the cement industry, the petroleum refining industry and the pulp and paper industry) as well as selected high-purity sources of CO₂ were discussed. The factors found to have the greatest overall impact were the initial cost of CCS at the start of deployment and the start date at which large scale deployment is started.  The talk then moved on to the applications of high temperature solid looping cycles (Calcium and Chemical Looping) and their integration with different industries, including research conducted at IC investigating the applications of pressurized calcium looping.  The presentation also included an update on research conducted as part of the EU ASCENT and LEILAC projects.

  Paul Fennell giving his talk

Paul Fennell is a Professor of Clean Energy at Imperial College London. He obtained his degree in Chemical Engineering and PhD from the University of Cambridge. He is a Chartered Chemical Engineer and Scientist and Fellow of the IChemE. He also has Chaired the Institution of Chemical Engineers Clean Energy SIG, was a previous member of the International Energy Authority High-Temperature Solid Looping Cycles Network Executive, and has written reports for the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) on future technologies for Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) and carbon capture readiness. He has been director of Imperial College’s Centre for Carbon Capture and Storage and is the deputy director (CO₂ capture) of the recently re-funded UKCCSRC. He has published 100 + papers since 2005 and is the 2015 winner of the Institution of Chemical Engineers’ Ambassador prize. His interests are broad, encompassing waste utilisation, cement production and phytoremediation, as well as carbon capture and storage.

  “The Enlightenment has failed”

  Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO
  School of Medical Sciences, UNSW

This event’s unique format featured an optional buffet dinner followed by the sophistry and live music.

Thursday 5 April 2018

Mitchell Theatre, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt St, Sydney

Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO led an interactive sophistry that discussed the statement “the Enlightenment has failed” and the extent to which Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz is correct in his view that “global deflation is reversing international progress through rejection of the principles of the Enlightenment”. Attendees were encouraged to participate in the discussion.

Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO completed his BA at The University of California at Berkeley, his PhD at McGill University, and spent a postdoctoral year at Yale University. He and Charles Watson are the authors of The Rat Brain in Stereotaxic Coordinates. With over 50,000 citations across its 7 Editions (March 2014), it is the third most cited book in science after Molecular Cloning and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Prof Paxinos has also published another 45 books on the structure of the brain of humans and experimental animals, his most recent being MRI/DTI Atlas of the Rat Brain. His work was recognised by an AO, Ramaciotti Medal, Humboldt Prize, a $4 million NHMRC Australia Fellowship and the NSW Premier’s Prize for Excellence in Medical Biological Sciences in 2015. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia and a corresponding member of the Academy of Athens. His novel In His Image was published in Greek in 2015 (English version pending).

This was the fifth and final in a series of lectures on the theme "Is the Enlightenment dead?" co-hosted by the Royal Society of NSW and the Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts

Other lectures in the series:
Lecture 1“Samuel Pepys, his library and the Enlightenment” Susannah Fullerton OAM FRSN, Author, lecturer and literary tour leader, 4 September 2017
Lecture 2: “The freedom to use your own intelligence: The Enlightenment and the growth of the Australian nation” Emeritus Professor Robert Clancy AM FRSN, 6 November 2017
Lecture 3: "Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the museum” Kim Mckay AO, Director and CEO, Australian Museum, 5 February 2018
Lecture 4: “Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the library” by Paul Brunton OAM FAHA, Emeritus Curator, New South Wales State Library, 1 March 2018

“Precision healthcare – the coming revolution in medicine”

  Professor Leslie Burnett
  Chief Medical Officer of Genome One
  Garvan Institute of Medical Research

Wednesday 7 March 2018
Union, University & Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

Medicine has entered a period of major transformation. Advances in DNA sequencing have led to an explosion in data, information and knowledge about how the genes in our genome work. In turn, this is opening new avenues for diagnosis and treatment of both rare and common disorders. Leslie gave a brief refresher overview of genetics and genomics, including the range of genetic tests available culminating in whole genome analysis. This analysis is now available in Australia, and Australia is at the forefront of the world. Examples were given of the application of genomic techniques to “precision medicine”, where a person’s genetic makeup is used to target treatments based on their specific needs. The era of preventative medicine and precision healthcare has arrived, but it will be accompanied with the need to recognise and responsibly address some complex ethical and societal issues.

Professor Leslie Burnett is Chief Medical Officer of Genome.One, in the Kinghorn Centre for Clinical Genomics, Garvan Institute of Medical Research. Leslie has pioneered the development of many pathology and genetics initiatives, including being a Medical Director for the accreditation of Australasia’s first Whole Genome Sequencing laboratory and founding Australia’s first Community Genetics program.

He is a clinical pathologist with experience in both the public and private health sectors, and is a recipient of many awards for business and technical excellence, service excellence and community service. He has served as ministerial appointee, chairman, or president of a number of national and international bodies in pathology and genetics.

Professor Burnett is Conjoint Professor at the St Vincent’s Clinical School, UNSW Australia, Honorary Professor in Pathology and Genetic Medicine in the Sydney Medical School, and has been an Honorary Associate of the School of Information Technologies, at the University of Sydney. His current interests are in the areas of genomic pathology, genetic screening, bioinformatic modelling of population genetics and cell biology processes, and quality assurance. He is a passionate teacher and communicator about the genetics and genomics revolution.

  Paul Brunton OAM
  Emeritus Curator 
  State Library of NSW

Thursday 1 March 2018
Mitchell Theatre, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt St, Sydney

The penal colony of New South Wales was a child of the Enlightenment. It was founded on the belief in personal improvement and progress. It was not a dumping ground for convicts but an experiment in Enlightenment values. Libraries could play a key role in the moral and intellectual improvement of the individual. This talk will discuss the foundations of four libraries: Australian Subscription Library and Reading Room [now the State Library of New South Wales] (1826), Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts Library (1833), Evandale [Tasmania] Subscription Library (1847), and the Melbourne Public Library [now State Library of Victoria] (1854), and the Enlightenment values which guided their founders.

Paul Brunton OAM, FAHA is Emeritus Curator, State Library of New South Wales. He worked with the Mitchell Library’s Australiana collections for 40 years and was Curator of Manuscripts from 1986 to 2001 and Senior Curator from 2002-2012. Paul has published on archives administration and on various aspects of the State Library’s collection. He was President of the Australian Society of Archivists, 1991-1993. He was curator of the exhibition Matthew Flinders: the Ultimate Voyage which opened at the State Library in 2001, and traveled nationally during 2002-2003. His annotated edition of Flinders’ letters, Matthew Flinders: personal letters from an extraordinary life, was published in 2002.

This is the fourth in a series of lectures on the theme “Is the Enlightenment dead?” being co-hosted by the Royal Society of NSW and the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts.

Lecture 1: “Samuel Pepys, his library and the Enlightenment” by Susannah Fullerton FRSN, on 4 September 2017

Lecture 2: “The freedom to use one's own intelligence: the Enlightenment and the growth of the Australian nation” by Professor Robert Clancy AM FRSN, on 6 November 2017

Lecture 3: "Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the museum” Kim McKay AO, Director and CEO, Australian Museum, on 5 February  2018

Lecture 5: Sophistry: “Global deflation: the Enlightenment has failed!” by Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO FRSN, on 5 April 2018

  

  Kim McKay AO
  Director and CEO
  The Australian Museum

Monday 5 February 2018
Mitchell Theatre, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt St, Sydney

This was the third in a series of lectures on the theme “Is the Enlightenment dead?” being co-hosted by the Royal Society of NSW and the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts.

Kim McKay AO, Director and CEO of the Australian Museum, talked about the Museum’s 190-year history and its evolution as an expression of the Enlightenment.

The Australian Museum, along with its sister museums in Victoria and South Australia, was a major focus of the intellectual life of colonial Australia and at the forefront of contemporary science and natural history research. Kim also described the Museum’s recent transformation during her tenure as Director and CEO, and the challenges that lie ahead, particularly visitation, digitisation and international collaboration and why Museums will continue to play an important role in shaping society.

Other talks in the series:

Lecture 1: “Samuel Pepys, his library and the Enlightenment” by Susannah Fullerton, on 4 September 2017

Lecture 2: “The freedom to use one's own intelligence: the Enlightenment and the growth of the Australian nation” by Professor Robert Clancy AM FRSN, on 6 November 2017

Lecture 4: “Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the library” by Paul Brunton OAM Emeritus Curator, State Library of NSW, on 1 March 2018

Lecture 5: Sophistry: “Global deflation: the Enlightenment has failed!” by Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO FRSN, on 5 April 2018

Royal Society of NSW Scholarship Award Winners for 2018

Grace Causer, Institute for Superconducting and Electronic Materials, University of Wollongong

Yu-wei Lin, Advanced Drug Delivery Group, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Sydney

Cara Van Der Wal, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney

Wednesday 7 February 2018
Union, University and Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

Royal Society of NSW Scholarships
The Royal Society of New South Wales Scholarships recognise outstanding achievements by individuals working towards a research degree in a science-related field within New South Wales or the Australian Capital Territory. Each year three scholarships of $500 plus and a complimentary year of membership of the Society are awarded. The award winners give talks about their research at the first OGM and Public Lecture each year.

  
 “Uncovering hidden nanoscale worlds
    with neutrons”

  Grace Causer
  University of Wollongong and
  Australian Nuclear Science and Technology
  Organisation

For decades, neutrons have been used to probe almost all kinds of matter to unveil hidden characteristics, such as, the dynamics of chemical reactions, the performance of engineering components under strain, and the properties of low-dimensional systems. By reflecting polarised neutrons off layered structures, scientists have been able to gain unique insights into magnetic surfaces and ultra-thin films. Fundamentally, scientific insights gained from neutron scattering have been, and will continue to be, important for the development of future thin-film-based technologies. For example, giant magnetoresistive structures, for which Albert Fert and Peter Gruenberg won the 2007 Nobel Prize in Physics, have revolutionised computer technology. In this talk, In her talk Grace discussed a number of prototype thin-film devices which she has investigated as part of her PhD research. Specifically, the interface physics of an exemplar high-density magnetic recording device formed by ion-beam irradiation, and a magnetic thin-film sensor designed to act as a safety switch in next-generation vehicles powered by hydrogen, will be discussed.

 ****

  “Developing new ways to treat ‘superbugs’
   using old antibiotics: Are we there yet?”

  Yu-wei (Wayne) Lin
  Advanced Drug Delivery Group
  Faculty of Pharmacy 
  University of Sydney

Antimicrobial resistance is one of the greatest threats to human health globally. Multidrug-resistant (MDR) Pseudomonas aeruginosa is at the top of the 2017 World Health Organisation Priority Pathogen List that requires the utmost need for novel antibiotics. MDR P. aeruginosa often causes life-threatening lung infections particularly in immune-compromised patients such as those with cystic fibrosis. As no novel classes of antibiotics will be available for many years to come, polymyxins, a class of ‘old’ antibiotics, are being increasingly used as a last-line therapy for lung infections caused by MDR P. aeruginosa. Over the last decade, inhalation of polymyxins has become a complementary practice for treating life-threatening lung infections. Notably, currently used inhalational dosage regimens of polymyxins are empirical, and this is likely a cause for the increased polymyxin resistance. Yu-wei described the overarching theme of his PhD research, which is to investigate the pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics/toxicodynamics of inhaled polymyxins, to maximise antimicrobial efficacy while minimising toxicity and emergence of resistance.

****

  “Reconstructing the phylogeny and evolutionary
   history of mantis shrimps using molecular data”

  Cara Van Der Wal
  School of Life and Environmental Sciences
  University of Sydney

Mantis shrimps (Crustacea: Stomatopoda) are ecologically and often economically significant crustaceans, being dominant predators in many coastal ecosystems and serving as an important fisheries resource. They are a highly specialised rather than highly diversified lineage, with highly modified hunting appendages and sophisticated vision. Despite these unique attributes much remains unknown about stomatopod systematics, evolution and phylogeny. To fill this knowledge gap, I used molecular sequence data to estimate the phylogeny and evolutionary timescale of the group. Her research results show that Stomatopoda appeared in the Carboniferous and that the specialised spearing appendage evolved prior to the specialised smashing appendage. Additionally, the results showed that morphological complexity within stomatopod eyes has reduced independently in different lineages, and that this reduction might be linked to the environment. The results have significantly added to the knowledge of stomatopod evolution and diversification, suggesting systematic revisions may be required.

“How to store light: an optical memory based on sound waves”

  
  Moritz Merklein
  Department of Physics
  University of Sydney

  Jak Kelly Award winner for 2017

Wednesday 6 December 2017
Union, University and Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

The Jak Kelly Award was created in honour of Professor Jak Kelly (1928 - 2012), who was Head of Physics at University of NSW from 1985 to 1989, was made an Honorary Professor of University of Sydney in 2004, and was President of the Royal Society of NSW in 2005 and 2006. Its purpose is to encourage excellence in postgraduate research in physics. It is supported by the Royal Society of NSW and the Australian Institute of Physics, NSW branch. The winner was selected from a short list of candidates who made presentations at a recent joint meeting at UNSW of the Australian Institute of Physics NSW Branch, the Royal Australian Chemical Institute and the Royal Society of NSW.

The Jak Kelly Award was presented to Moritz Merklein by John Hardie FRSN, a past president of the Society.

In his lecture Moritz presented a memory for optical data that is based on sound waves and has the potential to revolutionize next-generation computer chips. Today, mediating heat is one of the most significant challenges in computing, particularly in large data centres. Photonic interconnects can solve this challenge, connecting different processing units without generating heat, while offering a broad bandwidth and data throughput. However, the vast speed of light is imposing new challenges on these integrated circuits that harness light as information carriers, requiring an optical memory to slow down information for buffering, synchronization, re-routing and further processing of the data. Controlling the speed of light is challenging, and so far no method has been developed that reaches the required bandwidth, the fractional delay, and is compatible with complex optical data encoding schemes, and least of all can be integrated into a photonic circuit. Transferring the optical data to sound waves can provide a powerful solution to this challenge, enabling to slow down of the flow of information on the chip. It is like storing a flash of lightning inside thunder.

Moritz Merklein received his Physics Diplom from the University of Konstanz, Germany in 2012. His thesis dealt with the fabrication of silicon nitride nanostructures and the characterisation of their mechanical modes using ultrafast pump-probe spectroscopy. Moritz joined the stimulated Brillouin scattering group in the Department of Physics at The University of Sydney as a PhD student in 2014. During his PhD, he has made significant contributions to the field of stimulated Brillouin scattering, which describes the interaction between sound and light waves. His research supervisors are Professor Benjamin Eggleton and Dr. Birgit Stiller. During his PhD studies, he served as the president of the University of Sydney optics student chapter and has engaged in many outreach activities.

“Semiconductor nanostructures and quantum phenomena”

  Professor Sir Michael Pepper FRS
  Pender Chair in Nanoelectronics
  University College London

Dirac Lecture and Medal Presentation

Professor Pepper was also presented with an Honorary Degree from UNSW after his lecture.

Thursday 21 November 2013

Law Theatre, UNSW

Industry innovation has developed a combination of electron beam lithography and advanced semiconductor growth. This has stimulated interest in discovering more about the basic properties of semiconductor nanostructures.

The Lecture showed how advanced semiconductor growth technology, which was developed for the information technology industry, has allowed the creation of new types of structures for investigating the quantum aspects of electron transport. It also showed how the dimensionality which is experienced by the electrons can be reduced from 3 to 2 to 1 and then to 0.

History of the Dirac Lecture:

The Dirac Medal for the Advancement of Theoretical Physics is awarded by the UNSW and the Australian Institute of Physics. The Lecture and the Medal commemorate the visit to the university in 1975 of Professor Dirac, who gave five lectures. The lectures were subsequently published as a book Directions of Physics. Professor Dirac donated the royalties from this book to the University for the establishment of the Dirac Lecture and Prize. The prize includes a silver medal and honorarium. It was first awarded in 1979.

“Re-thinking science education in Australian schools: development and implementation of the National Science Curriculum”

  Dr Mark Butler

  Department of Education and Communities

Wednesday 6 November 2013

Union, University and Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

Dr Butler examined the development and nature of the new national senior high school science curriculum. In 2008 the Federal Government secured agreement with all state and territory governments to develop a national F-12 school curriculum. Responsibility for developing the curriculum was assigned to the newly established, Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). The national F-10 Science curriculum was completed in 2011 and will be implemented in NSW schools from 2014.

In December 2012 the curricula for senior courses in Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Earth and Environmental Science were completed and signed off by the state and territory governments. Provided the newly elected Federal Government continues to support the new curriculum, the national senior science courses will be introduced in NSW schools in 2016.

The senior science curriculum was developed to reflect international best practice in science education. The courses were designed to cater for students who wished to pursue further study in science and for those who would not continue to study science beyond school level. But in spite of two extensive rounds of public consultation and over two years of refinement, the national senior science curriculum remains controversial and the content chosen, and the three strands (Science as Human Endeavour, Science Inquiry Skills and, Knowledge and Understanding) used to present it, continue to cause some concern. While the new courses will undoubtedly address the issues of comparability and consistency, only time will tell if the new courses will attract more students to study science and/or more effectively prepare students for studying science at tertiary level.

Dr Mark Butler is currently Head Teacher of Science at Gosford High School and the National Education Convener of the Australian Institute of Physics. He has taught science in secondary schools in NSW and has been an active member of the professional science education community for over thirty years. Dr Butler is particularly interested in developing strategies to encourage more students to study science in senior high school and at tertiary level.

“Probing the nano-world with the symmetries of light”

  Xavier Zambrana-Puyalto
  Department of Physics and Astronomy
  ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered
  Quantum Systems, Macquarie University

  Winner of the RSNSW Jak Kelly Scholarship
  Award for 2013

Wednesday 18 December 2013

Union, University and Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

The Jak Kelly Award was created in honour of Professor Jak Kelly (1928 - 2012), who was Head of Physics at University of NSW from 1985 to 1989, was made an Honorary Professor of University of Sydney in 2004, and was President of the Royal Society of NSW in 2005 and 2006. Its purpose is to encourage excellence in postgraduate research in physics. It is supported by the Royal Society of NSW and the Australian Institute of Physics, NSW branch. The winner is selected from a short list of candidates who made presentations at the most recent Australian Institute of Physics, NSW branch postgraduate awards.

In 1959, Richard Feynman gave a seminal lecture titled “There’s plenty of room at the bottom” which pushed scientists to set out on the journey of controlling light/matter interactions at the nano-scale. Since then, nanotechnology has rapidly developed. Nowadays it is inconceivable to think of any new information devices whose circuits are not in the nano-scale. Whereas nanoelectronics is a well consolidated technology producing transistors of less than 50 nm, nanophotonics has yet to overcome some drawbacks. So far, probably the most successful way of pushing light technology to the nano-scale has been plasmonics. In plasmonics, plane waves are used to excite smartly designed nano-structures to couple light with free electrons oscillations on a metallic surface and transmit information. Xavier showed that if symmetry considerations are taken into account and more elaborate beams of light are used, extra information can be retrieved from the same samples. To prove this, he presented a recent experiment carried out in his group where the complex behavior of a circular nano-metric aperture is easily predicted using symmetry considerations. The experiment deals with an old problem – the circular dichroism (CD) of a sample. CD is a widely used technique in science, and its uses range from DNA studies to protein spectroscopy. It is defined as the differential absorption of left and right circular polarization. Typically, it is established that CD can only be found in interactions with chiral structures, i.e. structures whose mirror image cannot be superimposed with them. Xavier showed that non-chiral structures, such as a circular nano-aperture, can also produce CD when light beams with cylindrical symmetry are used. This allows one to reconcile the experimental results and extend the current understanding of this phenomenon using symmetry considerations.

Presentations by Royal Society of NSW scholarship winners 2014

Date: Wednesday 5 February 2014

Venue: Union University and Schools Club, 25 Bent St, Sydney

John Chan (Pharmacology, University of Sydney)

Jessica Stanley (Chemistry, University of Sydney)

Jiangbo (Tim) Zhao (Advanced Cytometry, Macquarie University)

This presentation was delivered by A/Prof. Judith Dawes.

   “Women artists: barriers and frustrations”

   Pamela Griffith

   Artist, designer, master printer and author

Wednesday 1 November 2017
Union, University and Schools Club, 25 Bent Street, Sydney

Pamela Griffith shared some of the joys and challenges she has encountered as a female artist. Her talk was illustrated by images of her work and some works of women artists of the past. 

Females are often the model and rarely the artist, and this has led to some offensive and exploitative works around the female subject matter that have coloured the way people see women in art. It has also affected how women see themselves. Pamela speculated on where historically female artists acquired their training and how they were assisted to have an art career by their families and patrons. She showed how they overcame social difficulties and barriers to making art. She tracks what happened to their art.

The presentation attempted to explain art history’s omission of almost all women from its canon. There is an ongoing resistance of art museums to buying art made by women. Few women have solo shows before they are dead. Most women who go to art schools and make up the majority never have their work displayed in any big museums or bought for major collections. Does this mean that women at art schools are wasting their time?

Pamela Griffith is an an artist, designer, master printer and author. She has had over 100 one-woman exhibitions in over 30 galleries. Her work is included in National, State and Regional Gallery collections across Australia and in major corporate and private collections in Australia, Europe, USA and Asia. Major commissions include Bicentennial and Macquarie toiles; Mary McKillop toile; portraits of distinguished Australians such as Dame Joan Sutherland, Richard Bonynge, Sir William Dean, Cardinal George Pell, Professor Marie Bashir and Elena Kats-Chernin; numerous etching editions for corporations including Qantas, Comalco, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. She is also the author of over 80 articles and two books on art.

  “The freedom to use your own intelligence:
  the Enlightenment and the growth of the
  Australian nation”

  Emeritus Professor Robert Clancy AM FRSN
  School of Biomedical Sciences and Pharmacy
  University of Newcastle

Monday 6 November 2017
Mitchell Theatre, Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, 280 Pitt St., Sydney

In this second lecture of the Enlightenment series Emeritus Professor Robert Clancy asks us to consider the fact that in little more than a century, a gaol established in Sydney Cove with 1000 souls joined the international stage as an independent Federated nation of in excess of three million – an unprecedented event in the history of man! This presentation explores the theme that the convict settlement was the ‘perfect storm’ to test the idea that the Enlightenment with its roots in late Middle Age Europe, and finding its expression in the Laws of Newton and the logic of Locke, created a confidence and capacity for humanity to achieve a new potential. Professor Clancy will first discuss the influence of the dominant contemporary ideas in science as introduced by James Cook and Joseph Banks and how this plays out in a young Australia in its impact on patterns of scientific development. Second, the self-belief and ‘have a go’ mentality reflected John Locke’s optimistic view of men and women forced to face and control extraordinary challenges not just to survive, but to create a new and independent society, based on science and the goodness of man. The question today is “have we lost that spirit of the Enlightenment to reactive conservatism?”

Emeritus Professor Robert Clancy has had a distinguished career as a clinical immunologist. He was awarded an AM for his services to immunology, as well as to cartography through his collection of early maps of Australia. He was Foundation Chair of Pathology at the University of Newcastle and the Director of the Hunter Immunology Unit.

Professor Clancy is a expert on medical history, with a particular focus on the history of infectious disease and immunology, including the impact of plague. He led the ASAEurope: the History of Medicine and Pharmacy tour in 2006, 2011, 2013 and 2015 and has developed a ‘History of Medicine’ course through the College of Physicians. Another area of expertise is cartography and he has written two books on the mapping of Australia and Antarctica (The Mapping of Terra Australis and So Came They South).

This series of five talks, co-hosted by the Royal Society of NSW and the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, brings together the two oldest institutions in NSW dedicated to education, the discussion of ideas, and discovery. The series is expected to initiate a period of interactive events and activities to the mutual benefit of both societies. The lectures will be presented by an outstanding group of experts in the field, with the topics chosen to represent a broad overview of the Enlightenment from its beginnings as the public recognised and discussed the meanings of change from a long period of mythology and dogma, to grasping reality and what that meant to them and their lives, to its impact on our society today.

The Enlightenment was founded on reasoned discourse and scientific enquiry, connecting with the idea of human equality and the rights of the individual. It was a powerful influence through disruptive revolutions in the 18th century on European and American societies. But what influence did it have on our Australian society, and the institutions entrusted to inform the population of new ideas and discovery? On a more concerning note, to what extent is Nobel Lauriet Joseph Stiglitz correct correct in his view that “Global deflation is reversing international progress through rejection of the principles of the Enlightenment”.

These five Lectures will capture the beginnings of the Enlightenment, its immediate impact on colonial Australia, and two portals of the Enlightenment and their adaptation to changes around them over 200 years. The series will conclude with an interactive Sophistry, taking the theme of the series, and discussing this in the context of contemporary Australian life.

Other lectures in the series:
Lecture 1: “Samuel Pepys, His library and the Enlightenment” by Susannah Fullerton OAM FRSN, author, lecturer and literary tour leader, 4 September 2017
Lecture 3: “Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the museum” by Kim Mckay AO, Executive Director and CEO, the Australian Museum, 1 February 2018
Lecture 4: “Learning, adaptation and the Enlightenment: the library” by Paul Brunton OAM FAHA, Emeritus Curator, New South Wales State Library, 1 March 2018
Lecture 5: Sophistry – “Global deflation : The Enlightenment has failed!” by Scientia Professor George Paxinos AO FRSN, 5 April 2018

“Is it possible to predict the behaviour of closed physical systems? From the solar systems to a quantum computer”

  Professor Boris Altshuler
  Department of Physics
  Columbia University
  New York

Monday 6 November 2017
Ritchie Theatre, John Niland Scientia Building, UNSW

The Dirac Medal for the Advancement of Theoretical Physics is awarded by UNSW in association with the Australian Institute of Physics NSW branch and The Royal Society of NSW. The Lecture and the Medal commemorate the visit to UNSW in 1975 of the British Nobel laureate, Professor Paul Dirac. Professor Dirac gave five lectures which were published as a book Directions of Physics. He donated the royalties to UNSW for the establishment of the Dirac Lecture and Prize, which consists of a silver medal and honorarium. It was first awarded in 1979.

The historical background to Professor Altshuler's lecture goes back to the mechanics of Lagrange following Newton with the integrable systems of equations of motion as deterministic mathematics, in contrast to the ergodic systems describing chaotic motion, known from the Brownian motion of particles. (An ergodic system is one where the position of the points in the system averages out over time, so that if the system runs for a very long time its initial state cannot be determined.) This phenomenon was first observed under a microscope by the 19th-century scientist Robert Brown, and was referred to as the thermo-statistical motion of molecules. This research was further developed by von Oswald, Boltzmann, and last but not least in Einstein’s PhD thesis in Zürich 1905, where he demonstrated that he could arrive at Avogadro’s number. The distance between two molecules increases defining the Lyapunov constant.

Professor Altshuler traced the development of Bose-Einstein statistics leading to the Anderson Localization – for which a Nobel Prize was awarded – and entangled quantum states. These are non-ergodic systems and may be important to the development of quantum computing algorithms.

L to R: Prof. Sven Rogge (Head, School of Physics, UNSW), Dr. Herma Buttner (RSNSW Secretary), Prof. Nicholas Fisk (DVC Research, UNSW), A/Prof. Matthew Arnold (Chair, AIP NSW branch), Prof. Boris Altshuler, Prof. Emma Johnston (Dean of Science, UNSW), Dr. Donald Hector (past President of RSNSW)