People
| Scientists | ||
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John Chiefari – Senior Principal Research Scientist
BSc(Hons), PhD (Flinders University) Post-Docs: University of Nevada, Reno; Max Planck Institute |
John Chiefari’s research experience has spanned materials, biomedical and chemicals domains and he has a track record of research management of programs focusing on delivering benefits and impact for these industries. His career developed to encompass business development, commercialisation and technology transfer. His current focus is to translate research and technologies into commercial applications. |
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Milena Czyz – Postdoctoral Fellow
BSc(Hons) (Adelaide) & PhD (UNSW) Post-Docs: University of Michigan (USA)
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Dr Czyz is an organic chemist with interests in catalysis and photochemistry. She is currently working as a Postdoctoral Fellow with Dr Anastasios Polyzos at CSIRO. Her work is focussing on C-H activation of small molecules and photoredox chemistry. |
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Mrs Cecily Eldridge
Scientist – Research Projects Officer BSc(Chemistry/Biochemistry) Swinburne Hons(organic chemistry) Swinburne /CSIRO
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Mrs Eldridge is formally trained as an organic synthetic chemist. Mrs Eldridge has specialized skills in both flow chemistry and the scale up of manufacturing processes for industry. Mrs Eldridge also has significant experience in robotics and automation. |
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Richard Evans – Project Leader: Senior Principal Research Scientist
BSc (UQ); BSc(Hons 1st) (UQ) & PhD (UQ) |
Dr Evans is organic polymer chemist. His research interest in is the development of highly functional materials with stimuli responsiveness being a recurring theme. He has published or patented in the areas of click chemistry, non-linear dyes, dyes and hole transport compounds for organic solar cells, new paint resins, low shrinkage ring-opening polymerization and functional ATRP and RAFT agents. |
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Dr Damian Fullston – Research Scientist-Engineer
BSc (Adelaide); BAppSc(Hons) & PhD (UniSA) Post-Doc: CSIRO |
Dr Fullston engineers surfaces and materials properties, and designs processes for both inorganic and organic materials production for industrial applications. Dr Fullston’s work solves materials science and engineering problems using sustainable materials, chemistry and processes. |
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James Gardiner – Senior Research Scientist
BSc, MSc, PhD (Canterbury, NZ) Post-Docs: ETH Zurich (Seebach) UMelb (Holmes) |
Dr Gardiner trained as an organic chemist and has expertise in new synthetic methods for industrial processes, peptide chemistry, and polymers. Dr Gardiner’s research interests include continuous flow processing (Floworks), catalysis, bioactive molecules and synthetic methodology. He works across a range of disciplines with chemists, biologists, and material scientists to achieve focused outcomes. |
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Christian Hornung – Research Team Leader
MSc (Erlangen Univ.); PhD (Cambridge Univ.) Post-Docs: Cambridge Univ. & CSIRO
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Dr Hornung is a trained chemical engineer and he currently leads CSIRO’s Centre for Industrial Flow Chemistry, FloWorks. Dr Hornung has several years of experience working in the flow chemistry and reactor technology area on the interface between chemistry and engineering. He works in multidisciplinary teams involved in the development of new chemical and polymer products and novel reactor solutions, combining additive manufacture with catalysis. |
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Oliver Hutt – Research Group Leader
BSc (Otago); BSc(Hons) & PhD (ANU) Post-Docs: Kansas (KU) & Minneapolis (UMN) |
Dr Hutt is formally trained as an organic chemist and he currently manages the Chemistry & Polymers Group at CSIRO. Dr Hutt’s research interest lies at the interface of the traditional disciplines. He works with multidisciplinary teams of chemists, biologists, and material scientists across a variety of fields. |
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Susan Holmes, Research Scientist
BSc (RMIT); BSc(Hons) (RMIT), PhD RMIT) |
Dr Holmes is formally trained as a polymer chemist. She has broad expertise in polymer science, ranging from modification and characterisation of polymers, nano-composites, fire retardant polymers, biopolymers, surface coatings as well as organic synthesis. She is currently part of the Applied Polymer Science team. |
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Priscilla (Pree) Johnston – Postdoctoral Fellow
BSc (Swinburne) & BSc(Hons); PhD (Monash) Post-Docs: Aston (UK) |
Pree is a trained polymer chemist, currently working on the development of a new water saving polymer technology for Agriculture. Pree’s research interests lie more broadly in designing and synthesising fit-for-purpose polymers that can help address important industrial and environmental issues in areas such as disposable/degradable plastics, energy and agriculture. |
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Thomas Kohl – Experimental Scientist
BSc (Hons) (UTAS) |
Thomas is formally trained as an organic chemist and currently works on commercial projects within the Continuous Chemical Processing team at CSIRO. Much of this work focusses on the development, scale-up and technical transfer of fine chemical and polymer processes from R&D to industry utilizing flow chemistry technology. |
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Guoxin Li – Senior Experimental Scientist
BSc (SDU); PhD (UNSW)
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Dr Li is a polymer chemist and he currently works in the field of polymer and material science. Dr Li’s research interest lies at the polymer synthesis and characterisation, polymer dispersed liquid crystal materials and polymer processing through extrusion, such as polymer blending and reactive extrusion. |
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Stuart Littler – Scale-up and HPLC Specialist
BSc (Deakin) |
Mr Littler is formally trained as an organic chemist and currently manages the Manufacturing Scale-up facility. Mr Littler has experience in the synthesis and scale-up of small molecules and polymers. He also has instrumentation experience, in particular with analytical and preparative HPLC. |
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Nino Malic – Senior Research Scientist
BSc, BSc(Hons) & PhD (Monash University, Australia)
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Dr Malic is formally trained as an organic chemist and has extensive research experience in polymer chemistry; from design, synthesis and functional group conjugation. He has worked in areas of photochromics, coatings, cosmetics, polymeric resins for mining, optical data storage and dental applications. |
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Ivan Martinez-Botella – Experimental Scientist
MSc. Chem. (Alicante University) |
Mr Martinez-Botella is formally trained as an organic chemist and he currently works on continuous flow chemistry of small molecules and polymers in the Chemistry & Polymers Group at CSIRO. |
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Graeme Moad – CSIRO Fellow
BSc; BSc(Hons) & PhD (Adelaide) Post-Doc: Pennsylvania State University (PSU |
Dr Moad was formally trained as a physical-organic chemist. His interests lie in the fields of polymerization mechanisms and polymer design and synthesis. He is an inventor of RAFT polymerization. Recent application areas are stimuli responsive polymers, self-segregating systems, sequence-defined polymers, polymer surface modification, polymer nanocomposites, reactive extrusion, network polymers and 3D-printing. |
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Anastasios (Tash) Polyzos – Senior Research Scientist
BSc (RMIT); PhD (La Trobe University) Post-Docs: CSIRO (Australia) and University of Cambridge (United Kingdom) |
Dr Polyzos is an expert in synthetic organic chemistry and flow chemistry. He has successfully led complex industry projects and has directed a strong research program in fundamental organic chemistry, catalysis and flow chemistry. Dr Polyzos holds a joint appointment with the University of Melbourne and CSIRO Manufacturing, and he currently serves as Director of the ARC Industrial Transformation Centre – Chemical Industries. |
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Almar Postma – Senior Research Scientist
BSc(Hons): Surrey University, UK PhD: UNSW, Australia Post-Docs: University of Melbourne
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Dr Postma is formally trained as an organic chemist/polymer chemist. Dr Postma’s interests lie in the fields of polymer synthesis, design, mechanisms and applications. Crossing multidisciplinary areas such as polymer based biomedical nanomaterials, electroactive small molecules and polymers, and towards industrially relevant applications. |
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Nick Rigopoulos – Senior Experimental Scientist
BEng(Met) – RMIT PGradDip MatEng – Monash University |
Nick is a versatile materials engineer having spent almost 30 yrs in materials R&D in areas involving ceramics, metals and polymers. He has a broad knowledge of polymer/ceramic composites, which led to the develop a fire proof multicore electrical cables. |
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Melissa Skidmore
BSc, BSc(Hons) & PhD (University of Melbourne) Post-Doc: CRC Polymers |
Co-leading the Polymer Chemistry Team Dr Skidmore is an experienced organic, polymer and computational chemist who specialises in the development and commercialisation of CSIRO’s Reversible Addition Fragmentation chain Transfer (RAFT) polymerisation technology. |
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Ranya Simons – Research Team Leader
BEng (UNSW) & PhD (Melbourne)
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Dr Simons is trained as a polymer chemist and she currently manages the Applied Polymer Science Team at CSIRO. The team develops polymers, coatings and surface treatments with advanced functionalities utilising our expertise in organic and polymer chemistry, surface modification, and multifunctional coating design and characterisation. |
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Lisa Strover – Postdoctoral Fellow
BSc(Hons) – University of Auckland (NZ) PhD – University of Auckland (NZ) Postdoc – Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Israel) |
Lisa in an early career researcher with formal training in polymer chemistry. Her research interests lie in the design and synthesis of polymers with controlled architecture and functionality for applications in functional materials. Lisa’s current work is focussed on developing industrially-applicable electrochemically controlled reversible-deactivation radical polymerisation (RDRP) methods, in particular eRAFT |
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John Tsanaktsidis – Research Director
BSc(Hons) & PhD Post-Docs: Chicago (UoC) & Postdoctoral Research Fellow (RSC, ANU) |
Dr Tsanaktsidis is the Research Director of The Advanced Fibre and Chemical Industries Program at CSIRO Manufacturing. With over 25 years of experience in developing and delivering scientific outcomes, John has demonstrated achievements in scientific research and management, technology commercialisation, and business leadership. |
| Matthew Waterford – Research Technician – Chemical scale-up facility
BSc(Hons) |
Matthew Waterford has formal training in Chemisty, and specialises in developing and optimising procedures for taking small scale chemical reactions to large scale batch or flow chemistry processes. Also assisting with the technology transfer of development projects from R&D to industry partners for commercial production. | |
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Weidong Yang – Senior Research Technician
BSc(Wuhan Uni.), Master (CAS) & PhD (UNSW)
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Dr. Weidong Yang has comprehensive knowledge, skills and experience in organic, inorganic, polymer synthesis and general applied chemistry. He has applied these skills to many commercial and strategic projects in a variety of areas such as organic synthesis, polymer and metal surface engineering, adhesion, composites and functional coatings. |
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Geethi Weragoda – OCE Postdoctoral Fellow
BSc(Hons): University of Peradeniya (Sri Lanka) PhD: University of Cincinnati (USA) Research Scholar: University of Hiroshima (Japan) |
Dr Weragoda is an early career researcher with experience in Physical Organic Chemistry and Photochemistry. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow with Dr Tash Polyzos, focusing on Photoredox catalysed C-H activation in natural hydrocarbons. She works collaboratively with Prof Richard O’Hair (Bio21) on developing multi-stage mass spectrometry in catalyst design and radical reaction screening. |
| Honorary Fellows | ||
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Kristine J. Barlow – Visiting Scientist / Associate Research Fellow at Deakin University
BSc, BSc(Hons) & PhD (Melbourne) Post-Docs: Texas A&M University, CSIRO & Deakin University (current) |
Dr Barlow is a polymer and organic chemist. In a joint project between Deakin University and CSIRO (BatTRI-Hub), she is developing solid polymer electrolytes for safer batteries. Her research interests lie in polymers for specified applications, such as battery components and flow processes. |
| Students | ||
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Yanyan Zhou – Visiting PhD student
Soochow University BSc, QUST University(China) China Scholarship Council (CSC)
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Yanyan Zhou majors in polymer chemistry and physics. In a joint project between China Scholarship Council (CSC) and CSIRO, she is working with Dr Graeme Moad as a visiting PhD student, focusing on design, synthesis and characterization of RAFT agents and polymerization conditions to provide sequence-defined polymers. |
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Mr Linghan Meng – Visiting PhD student
South China University of Technology BSc, Henan University of Technology China Scholarship Council (CSC) |
Mr Linghan Meng is researching polymer materials, particularly on the functionalization of starch-PLA-PBSA hybrid system and studying the interface and mechanical properties of the hybrid starch material. In collaboration with Dr Sheng Li at CSIRO he will work on the hydrophobic surface/coating base on naturally renewable materials such as starch. |