Library and Archives Committee

Professor Hans Bachor invented, and was the first to demonstrate, spatially multiplexed quantum optical communication systems. This discovery opened a new path for engineering practical quantum communication technologies. The demonstration was as elegant as it was innovative; the outcome of a lifetime of experimental achievement at the interface between quantum and classical optics. Science communication with diverse audiences is continuously changing, involving many new formats and technology. Hans Bachor contributes through a number of professional activities, in particular with school teachers, science communicators and early childhood educators.

Professor Steve Simpson is inaugural Academic Director of the Charles Perkins Centre and Professor in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Sydney. After graduating from the University of Queensland, he undertook his PhD at the University of London, then spent 22 years at Oxford before returning to Australia in 2005 as an ARC Federation Fellow, then ARC Laureate Fellow. Professor Simpson and David Raubenheimer developed an integrative modelling framework for nutrition (the Geometric Framework), which has been applied to a wide range of organisms, from slime moulds to humans, and problems, from aquaculture and conservation biology to the dietary causes of human obesity and ageing. He also pioneered understanding of swarming in locusts, with research spanning neurochemical events within the brains of individual locusts to continental-scale mass migration. He is the Executive Director of Obesity Australia and has been prominent in the media, including presenting a four-part documentary series for ABC TV, ‘Great Southern Land’. Professor Simpson was awarded the Academy’s Macfarlane Burnet Medal in 2022. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2007.

Dr TJ Higgins’ research provides an outstanding example of distinguished contributions to basic science leading to a range of applications in agriculture which are of national and global significance. He is widely recognized internationally for his contributions to our understanding of the biology and molecular genetics of the storage proteins formed in developing seeds and the regulation of expression of their coding genes. These studies, combined with his research on transgene technology, provided the basis for generating transgenic crops and pastures engineered to provide critical novel features. These include plants with either improved nutritional quality or resistance to viruses or insects.

Professor Curt Wentrup graduated Cand. scient. under K. A. Jensen, Copenhagen University, and PhD at the Australian National University with W. D. Crow. After post-doctorates with Hans Dahn (Lausanne), W. M. Jones (Gainesville) and Maitland Jones, Jr (Princeton), appointments as Maître-Assistant/Privat-Docent at l’Université de Lausanne and Professor at Universität Marburg, he returned to Australia in 1985 as Chair and Head of Organic Chemistry at The University of Queensland. He is DSc from Copenhagen, Dr.h.c. from Pau/France, Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, and received the Australian Centenary, Craig, Birch, and Leighton Medals. Now emeritus professor, he continues research in organic, physical, and historical chemistry.

Clare McLellan works in collections management of Archives and Special Collections at the University of Melbourne, with material that focuses on the University’s academic and scientific research. She is the previous archivist for the Australian Academy of Science, a former member of the Editorial Committee for the Historical Records of Australian Science, and a current member of the UNESCO Australian Memory of the World Committee and the Australian Women’s Archive Project Committee.