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A senior executive from The University of Western Australia has been appointed to the nation's pre-eminent research advisory body, the Australian Research Council Advisory Council.

Mathematician and computer scientist Professor Robyn Owens is UWA's Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), a position she took up this year.  At UWA, she is responsible for research policy development and general oversight of research, postgraduate education, industry liaison, intellectual property and commercialisation.

Another UWA academic, former Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Margaret Seares, has recently retired from the Council.

UWA Acting Vice-Chancellor Professor Bill Louden said Professor Owens was an outstanding academic with a distinguished career in mathematics, research and research training, who would bring a great deal of expertise to the Council.

"The appointment of Robyn Owens reflects the high esteem in which she is held by her peers and the Australian Government," Professor Louden said.  "Following on from the appointment of Margaret Seares, it is also an indication of the high regard for the standards of excellence being achieved at our University."

Professor Owens, along with UWA biochemist Professor Peter Hartmann, was last year awarded the prestigious UK Rank Prize for Nutrition for ground-breaking work modelling the process of human lactation.

Her research has focussed on computer vision, including feature detection in images, 3D shape measurement, image understanding, and representation.

Through her previous role as Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research & Research Training) at UWA, Professor Owens led the development and research training of over 1900 research students.

For further information about the ARC - see https://www.arc.gov.au/about_arc/default.htm

Media references

Janine MacDonald (UWA Public Affairs)  (+61 8)  6488 5563  /  (+61 4) 32 637 716