News Archive

Promotion briefs are provided by Elizabeth Hutchinson, Executive Officer, Academic Promotions Committee, Human Resources

WINTHROP PROFESSOR CAI-HENG LI (CENTRE FOR MATHEMATICS OF SYMMETRY AND COMPUTATION, SCHOOL OF MATHEMATICS AND STATISTICS)

Professor Cai-Heng Li is a world class researcher in the general areas of Algebraic Combinatorics and Permutation Group Theory.  He has developed a substantial record of high impact publications in journals recognised as important by his ISI ranking within the top 1% of mathematicians.  He commenced his academic career in 1997 when he won a UWA Postdoctoral Fellowship.  After his QE11 Fellowship terminated in 2008, he continued his work as an Associate Professor and Professor within UWA.

The Centre for Mathematics of Symmetry and Computation is led by internationally leading mathematician Winthrop Professor Cheryl Praeger and is a world class Centre crossing the boundary between group theory and combinatorics.  As the most senior member of the Centre, and Deputy Director, it is Winthrop Professor Cai-Heng Li's responsibility to enhance and promote the reputation of the Centre now and in the future.

He has acted as a link between UWA and several key Universities in China, supervising a number of PhD students for several top Universities such as Nankai, Yunnan, Zhongshan, Tsinghua, Central China and Peking.

He has given many keynote/invited talks at international conferences in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia. Since 2000, he has received 600 citations for his work in MathSciNet (the definitive source for pure mathematics), and he has collaborated with almost all of the senior international figures in his area.  He is also a member of a number of editorial boards.

RESEARCH PROFESSOR DAVID COWARD (SCHOOL OF PHYSICS)
Professor David Coward completed a PhD in 2003 and subsequently was awarded an ARC post -Doctoral Fellowship. In 2006 he was employed as a Senior Research Associate.  In that same year he led the planning and construction of the University's $1.5 million Zadko Telescope, initiating the collaboration between UWA and France to robotise the facility for optical transient science.  In 2010 he was awarded an ARC Future Fellowship to build international collaborations for Australian participation in large astronomy and space projects. The upgraded Zadko Telescope facility has played an important international role in understanding the biggest explosions in the Universe. The project, led by Professor Coward, builds on UWAs profile in excellence in astronomy and space research. Professor Coward would like to thank the Physics Head of School, Winthrop Professor Ian McArthur for his support in establishing the project, outstanding technical support from UWA Physics staff, especially John Moore, and the French collaborators who continue to work closely with UWA to optimize the science outcomes. Finally, the project would not have been realized without the philanthropic vision of James Zadko.

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR DEBRA McDOUGALL (ANTHROPOLOGY, SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES)

Associate Professor Debra McDougall was appointed to the University in 2006.  Since then she has established an international reputation as a leading anthropologist of the Pacific Islands and as an expert in the interdisciplinary study of religion and politics in Melanesia, especially the troubled nation of the Solomon Islands where Australia has an ongoing intervention mission.  Her expertise and interesting work in these areas has been vitally important to the area of Australian anthropology with the added distinction through her work on the Anthropology of Christianity which is currently a cutting edge topic in the discipline.