Dr Manolya Kavakli is an Associate Professor at the Department of Computing, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Macquarie University. She is the Director of the Virtual Reality Lab at the Simulation Hub and the Director of the Postgraduate Coursework Program.

She gained her BSc (1987), M.Sc. (1990) and Ph.D. (1995) degrees from Istanbul Technical University and was awarded a NATO Science Fellowship in 1996 for postdoctoral research. In 1998, she received a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the University of Sydney and in 2000 she took an active role in establishing the first Computer Science (Games Technology) degree as a Senior Lecturer at Charles Sturt University. In 2003, she established VISOR (Virtual and Interactive Simulations of Reality Research Group) at Macquarie University. In 2013 and 2014, Dr Kavakli received Research Professorship positions at the Virtual Immersion Research Group, Image Institute - Laboratory Le2i, Ecole Nationale Superieure d'Arts et Metiers ParisTech, from the French government to continue research collaboration in Virtual and Augmented Reality.

In 2015, together with her colleagues from the Department of Psychology, she established a Simulation Hub and CEPET (Centre for Elite Performance, Expertise and Training) Research Centre at Macquarie University. She has been the recipient of 14 awards, and received more than 37 grants from a number of scientific international organisations.