Sharath Sriram
Chair, EMCR Forum Executive
Australian Academy of Science
@EMCRForum
In 2016, we welcome five new members to the EMCR Forum Executive:
Hamish is currently Climate Science Coordinator in the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage, where he coordinates research, data management and delivery for a range of climate change impacts. He also recently completed a PhD at UNSW Australia looking at the impacts of climate change on bushfire risk. Hamish is interested in the link between science, policy and outcomes. He is committed to public interest science and collaborative, multidisciplinary approaches that engage end users from project conception to completion and beyond. Hamish also runs Science at the Local, bringing together scientists and community members in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney.
Drew is an Associate Professor and research leader of Energy and Advanced Manufacturing in the Future Industries Institute, University of South Australia. After completing his PhD at the Australian National University in 2006, he worked in private industry in Adelaide until late 2010, before joining the University of South Australia. Drew has published over 40 articles in journals such as Nature Materials and Advanced Materials, and secured $8.2 million in research funding for projects in partnership with industry. As a result of this he is co-inventor on numerous patents, which have led to several commercial products in the market place, including the world’s first plastic automotive mirror (>1.5 million on new vehicles in the USA). Drew was awarded the 2013 SA Young Tall Poppy of the Year award, and is a member of the South Australian Science Council.
Liz undertook her undergraduate and Masters studies at the University of Sydney, and completed her PhD in 2009 at Durham University, UK. From 2010 to 2011 she was a Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California (Berkeley). In 2012, Liz returned to the University of Sydney as a Lecturer in Inorganic Chemistry, holding a Discovery Early Career Researcher Award from the Australian Research Council (2012–14). Her research is focused on the development of small molecule fluorescent and magnetic resonance probes for the study of biological systems. Liz received the Royal Society of Chemistry Dalton Young Researchers Award (2011), the Asian Biological Inorganic Chemistry Early Career Researcher Award (2014), The Vice Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching (2015) and a NSW Young Tall Poppy Award (2015). She was the Royal Australian Chemical Institute NSW Nyholm Youth Lecturer in 2014–15, giving outreach talks in high schools throughout NSW.
Carly is a Research Scientist at CSIRO Food and Nutrition in Adelaide. She is a geneticist who uses molecular biology and bioinformatics to ‘study the unseen majority’ commonly known as microbes. Her current research is focused on characterising the role of microbes in promoting human gut health. Another area of interest is the study of methane-producing microbes, which allowed her to spend time in the United States as a Fulbright Professional Scholar in Climate Change and Clean Energy in 2015. Carly is a passionate advocate for gender diversity in science and is seeking to encourage more female EMCRs to acts as mentors, with the aim of enabling younger women coming through the system to reach their full potential.
Irene is a Senior Research Fellow at the Physics Department in Curtin University. Originally from Spain, Irene completed her PhD at the University of Sussex, UK in 2007. After a post-doc at the Institute of Materials of Nantes (France), she moved to Curtin University for her second post-doc in 2009. The following year she obtained an ARC Australian Postdoctoral Fellowship (2010–14). Her first daughter and her current ARC Future Fellowship award arrived almost at the same time in 2014. Her research career has been mainly dedicated to the atomistic modelling of carbon materials. In collaboration with experimental chemists, physicists and engineers, she has investigated graphite, diamond, amorphous carbons and a range of carbon nanomaterials. She has won multiple prizes for her scientific outreach projects and particularly enjoys creating scientific artistic images.
The Forum Executive is an evolving collection of early- and mid-career researchers from around Australia representing all fields of scientific endeavour. The Forum is always looking for enthusiastic EMCRs who are passionate advocates for science and eager to represent the interests of all EMCRs. A call for new members will be advertised towards the last quarter of 2015. Keep following EMCR Pathways for an announcement in the September issue, or follow us on Twitter.
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