Sunday, 24 March 2013
The latest academic promotion briefs are supplied by Elizabeth Hutchinson, Executive Officer, Academic Promotions Committee, Human Resources.
PROFESSOR
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
RESEARCH PROFESSOR
RESEARCH ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
RESEARCH ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
PROFESSOR
Professor Matthew Kilburn ( Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis )
Professor Kilburn commenced with the University in 2006. His primary role within the University is to provide leadership within the Ion Probe Facility. This includes developing high quality research around the state of the art ion probes, managing the day to day operation of the laboratory, and providing a seamless and expedient user experience. This technique explores the chemical and isotopic variations in materials at the micron to sub-micron scale. The NanoSIMS technique itself is still very young (the first commercial NanoSIMS was installed in 2000), but since Professor Kilburn's arrival at UWA, the Laboratory has become one of the most productive in the community.
CMCA is not part of or associated with a School, teaching by staff members is largely based on microscopy training courses, workshops, user support and student project supervision. CMCA staff also contribute to Undergraduate teaching progams in other Schools within the University where microscopy may have an integral role which may take the form of Unit coordination or invited lectures.
A key activity now involves performing nuclear forensic services for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). From October 2012 the Centre was inducted into the IAEA's Network of Analytical Laboratories (NWAL) after a two year qualification process. Professor Kilburn was also instrumental in ensuring that the Ion Probe Facility was included in Macquarie University's application to become an ARC Centre of Excellence.
PROFESSOR
Professor Fiona Pixley (Pharmacology, Pharmacy and Anaesthesiology Unit, School of Medicine and Pharmacology)
Professor Pixley commenced her appointment with UWA in 2007. The primary aim of her research is to understand the mechanisms regulating macrophage motility as tissue-infiltrating macrophages influence disease progression such as cancer spread. As both a clinician and scientist, Professor Pixley's expertise has enabled this research programme to become internationally recognised. She has taught into a broad range of undergraduate and professional degree courses and helped to develop the undergraduate pharmacology curriculum to a level of excellence that is widely appreciated by the students. Since her appointment she has taken on a number of leadership roles within the Unit, School, Faculty, University and the community, advising Government in the area of science and technology. She is currently Head of the Pharmacology, Pharmacy and Anaesthesiology Unit. Enrolments in the Biomedical Science Double Major have led to a planned enlargement of the Unit's teaching space and extensive curriculum development, collaboration and negotiations with other disciplines. She is a member of MD Curriculum Contents Committee and Chair of the Foundations of Medical Science Sub-Committee for the new medical degree.
PROFESSOR
Professor Eileen Webb (Law School)
Professor Webb commenced her appointment with the University in 2001. Her research is focussed on real property law, consumer law and related areas through publication in monographs and refereed journals, submissions and presentations to academic and professional audiences in Australia and overseas. She is a leading national and international expert on good faith and unconscionability particularly in relation to retail lease holders. In recent times she has expanded her research into the field of elder law which is becoming a field of growing importance particularly with an ageing population. She is combining her knowledge of consumer protection law and property law and interesting insights into effective ways of identifying and regulating financial and other abuse of elderly people.
She held the position of Associate Dean from 2003 - 2005 and has been a member of Academic Board. Eileen is co-director of the Consumer Research Unit in the Faculty of Law. She is also a member of a number of professional organisations.
PROFESSOR
Professor Adam Wittek (School of Mechanical and Chemical Engineering, Intelligent Systems for Medicine Laboratory)
Professor Wittek commenced with the University in 2004. His area of research is computational biomechanics of soft tissues for computer-integrated surgery in two applications:
- Soft organ surgery simulation
- Computation of soft organ deformation for image-guided surgery using biomechanical models.
His research aims at facilitating prediction of forces acting on a surgical tool and change of surgical target position during surgery. Professor Wittek is one of the pioneers of the application of non-linear finite element procedures with explicit integration in time domain (a method typically used in vehicle crash safety, impact analysis and stamping processes design) for such prediction. His recent contribution has been leading an ARC grant on meshless algorithms that overcome shortcomings of finite element method in modelling of soft tissues undergoing large deformations and cutting/dissection due to surgery. In 2012 Professor Wittek was awarded the Sir George Julius Bronze Medal by the Mechanical College of Engineers Australia for the best publication in the field of Mechanical Engineering.
He is a Mechanical Engineering Discipline representative in the Faculty Working Party for Masters of Professional Engineering MPE programme.
Since 2010, he has co-organised the Computational Biomechanics for Medicine CBM Workshops affiliated with the Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention MICCAI conference and has edited Workshop proceedings.
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Associate Professor David Barrie (History Discipline Group and Medieval and Early Modern Studies (MEMS), School of Humanities)
Associate Professor Barrie joined the University in 2008. His area of research is criminal justice history and he is recognised internationally in his field.
His first monograph Police in the Age of Improvement was very well received and was awarded the Frank Watson Prize for the best first book in Scottish history. He has since then co-edited a collection of essays and co-authored a substantial history of police courts in nineteenth century Scotland. Prestigious publisher Palgrave Macmillan has acknowledged his international standing by commissioning him to take up the editorship of a new series.
Since joining UWA in 2008 he has developed, co-ordinated and delivered a large number of new undergraduate units which have attracted large student numbers. For the last three years, he has served the School as Library Officer and sat on the Editorial Committee of the A-ranked journal Parergon , published by UWA Press. He has also served as Acting Head (MEMS).
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Associate Professor Elisa Birch (Economics, UWA Business School)
Associate Professor Birch commenced her appointment at Level B in 2004. Prior to this she was a Research Fellow in the Discipline. Since 2007 she has been employed in a teaching and research capacity. Her area of research centres on the labour market outcomes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, health outcomes and fertility behaviour in Australians, and men's and women's decisions to enter the workforce and on the number of hours they choose to work. Her research on labour supply, wages and time usage has been published in the Economic Record, Australian Economic Review, Journal of Economic Studies and the Australian Journal of Labour Economics . She has a national reputation in education economics.
In 2011, Elisa was awarded an Australian Research Council's Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA). This is a highly competitive fellowship which is for three years. Elisa was also awarded a UWA Excellence in Teaching Award for her tutoring of Business Economics and first year Macroeconomics in 2007. She was nominated for UWA Teaching Awards in 2008, 2010 and 2011 as well as being nominated for an external teaching award from Unijobs for Lecturer of the Year in 2008.
Associate Professor Birch has been active in the areas of service to the University as a member of the UWA Business School's Teaching and Learning Committee, the Economics Discipline's Course Restructuring Committee. She was the main organiser of the Shann Memorial Lecture for the Discipline group in 2007 and 2009, and has reviewed many articles for scholarly journals, conference papers and text books.
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Associate Professor John Lau (School of Mathematics and Statistics)
Associate Professor Lau joined the University in 2008. His research is focussed on the fields of non-parametric Bayesian statistics, econometrics, finance, and applied statistics and he is recognised internationally in this field. His research has given him the opportunity of working collaboratively in such countries as the United Kingdom, Italy, Hong Kong and Australia. He has taught Undergraduate Honours and Postgraduate units and his experiences with students from different cultures have led him to the development of a teaching style that welcomes student interaction and feedback.
He has been involved in both University and professional service activities including managing Postgraduate programmes, peer review, and coordinator of the degree Master of Financial Mathematics. He is an Associate Member of the Faculty Academy for the Scholarship of Education and regularly attends meetings and workshops on behalf of the School and the University.
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Associate Professor Brendan Lay (Discipline of Biomechanics, Motor Control and Development, School of Sport Science, Exercise and Health)
Associate Professor Lay commenced with the University in 2004. His area of research is Motor Control and Learning (both research and teaching). Associate Professor Lay prides himself on being a well organised supervisor who provides leadership and works as part of a productive team. This has led him to attracting a significant number of students from Honours into postgraduate study. He has co-authored two text books that have been widely adopted throughout Western Australian secondary schools in Physical Education Studies and 25 peer-reviewed journal articles. He has supervised to completion, 8 PhD, 5 Masters and 9 Honours students. He is currently supervising a further 5 PhD, one Masters and two Honours students. The research he will be undertaking over the next few years via funding from Healthway, will establish the Gaming Laboratory at the School of Sport Science, Exercise and Health.
He was a member of the UWA central Human Research Ethics Committee during 2007 - 2009 and currently chairs the Science Regional Ethics Review Committee. Where possible, he has been involved in community and professional outreach services such as presenting at professional development seminars for PE teachers and presenting at UWA EXPO each year.
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Associate Professor Joanne Sneddon, UWA Business School
Associate Professor Sneddon commenced her appointment with the University in 2005. Her research is focussed in the areas of agricultural innovation, ethical consumer behaviour and sustainable enterprise. Her portfolio is multi-disciplinary and contributes to key international journals in both agricultural sciences and management sciences.
Her research achievements were recognised by the School through the award of the Ahern Family Early Career Research Portfolio Award in 2009. Her significant contributions to teaching and learning were recognised by two Teaching Excellence Awards in 2005 and 2011. She has contributed to invited presentations to agricultural sector groups and she has also organised public seminars on key topics for industry. She has presented papers at major conferences in agriculture including the World Congress of Rural Sociology and the Australian Society of Animal Production as well as the Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management and the Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy.
RESEARCH PROFESSOR
Research Professor Ajmal Mian (School of Computer Science and Software Engineering)
Professor Mian commenced with the University in 2008. His research focusses on core computer vision problems such as the representation and comparison of 3D models, automatic identification of salient points on 3D surfaces and the extraction of highly descriptive features at these key points. His work on 3D object recognition is considered a benchmark and his algorithms for 3D face recognition are highly cited. Together with colleagues he has developed techniques for 3D facial expression modelling, 3D ear recognition, image set classification, and multispectral palm-print recognition. In 2012 he received the Early Career Scientist of the Year award and in 2011, the UWA Outstanding Young Investigator award. He is the only West Australian to have won the Australasian Distinguished Dissertation Award from CORE (Computing Research and Education Association of Australasia). This award has been given on an annual basis since 1995 to the best PhD thesis in Australasia. He is currently leading a research team of nine members.
RESEARCH ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Research Associate Professor Esther Ooi (School of Medicine and Pharmacology)
Research Associate Professor Ooi joined the University in 2005 as a teaching intern. Her area of research relates to cardiovascular disease (CVD) in obesity, insulin resistance and genetic disorders . Over a period of six years she has focussed on lipid metabolism and applied mathematical modelling and more recently, population studies and CVD risk. She was awarded the National Heart Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellowship and the NHMRC Early Career Fellowship. She still has strong ongoing collaborative links with Tufts University, Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston USA and these have networked to include Canada. Her research is carried out on an international level, recognised by the overall number of awards (28) received in recognition of the quality of her work.
Her research has resulted in the publication of 42 manuscripts, 21 as first author. Her research has been presented at national and international meetings including The Australian Atherosclerosis Society, The American Heart Association Scientific Sessions, The Arteriosclerosis Thrombosis and Vascular Biology Scientific Sessions, The American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions, The European Atherosclerosis Society and the International Symposium on Atherosclerosis.
Research Assistant Professor Jean-Michel Le Floch (School of Physics)
Assistant Professor Le Floch, known as J-M, commenced with the University in 2008 as an ARC International Linkage Fellow. In 2009 he took up the position of an ARC Postdoctoral Fellow, and was appointed to Research Associate in 2012. He is an engineering scientist with expertise in electromagnetic field computation and measurement. His area of research is dielectric material and device properties at different temperatures in the X-band frequency range (8-12GHz), including very highly confined mode resonators. His participation in ARC International Linkage and Discovery Projects has allowed investigation of a hybrid of optical and microwave techniques to adapt new technology to the underdeveloped millimetre wave band (30-300GHz). He was the inaugural winner of the Australian Distinguished Young Radio Scientist Award in 2010 as well as winning an URSI and CPEM Young Scientist Awards in 2008. An article about him was edited in the Australian Academy of Science. He is developing international collaboration in both research and teaching as well as being involved in the supervision of research projects for students from the National University of Singapore high School who visit UWA annually for a week for research experience.
As part of his UWA citizenship he has been a keen instigator in developing a cultural experience for staff and students by introducing the game of Pétanque (bocce). He takes this opportunity to invite those interested to participate each Friday lunch time, (location: Between Robert Street Building and Computer Science, Time: 12.30-1.30pm), join for the mailing list: [email protected] , to keep informed.
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