RESEARCH CHANGING LIVES | EDITION ONE 2019 NAILED IT! THE INCREDIBLE 2,500-YEAR-OLD SHIPWRECK DISCOVERY REVEALING SECRETS OF A MARITIME EMPIRE

GUT FEELINGS GOING DEEP RUNNING ON EMPTY Flinders researchers are linking Driverless cars may have captured Guidelines created by Flinders the neural connections between our imagination, but autonomous hydrogeologists are leading the world in the brain and gut to uncover clues marine vehicles have even bigger groundwater modelling that could help of the gut-brain, health and potential for change, both above prevent cities like Cairo or Cape Town wellbeing nexus. and below the waterline. from one day running completely dry. EDITION ONE

PERFORMANCES THAT LIVE ON 38

CONTENTS THE HOME THAT LOOKS OUT GOING DEEP 26 FOR YOU 40

FUTURE DIRECTIONS CLEAN, GREEN FOR FLINDERS CHEMICAL RUNNING RESEARCH 6 NAILED IT! 16 CRUSADER 28 ON EMPTY 42

THE DISCOVERY THE THAT CHANGED HOW CHANGING FACE WHEN INTELLECT THE WORLD TREATS OF GLOBAL WAS BORN 8 BOWEL CANCER 18 SECURITY 30 GUT FEELINGS 44

5 REVOLUTIONARY THE FUTURE OF MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES TRUST IN AN PRACTICE HEALTHCARE IS DIGITAL 10 THAT ARE CHANGING LIVES 20 ERA OF FAKES 32 MAKES PERFECT 46

THE WILDLY PAST POPULAR PERSPECTIVES PROJECT THAT’S FUTURE FROM A DEMYSTIFYING MAKERS 12 PIONEER 22 DEATH 34 HANDLE WITH CARE 48

HOW RESEARCHERS MARINE 5 FOSSIL CHANGED AUSTRALIA’S BIOTECHNOLOGY: DISCOVERIES WORDS MATTER TO RIGHTS OF APPEAL THE NEXT WAVE THAT STUNNED ABORIGINAL LIVES 14 LAWS FOREVER 24 FOR AUSTRALIA 36 THE WORLD 50

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 3 OVER OVER 100 PARTNER INSTITUTIONS WE LIVE IN AN AGE IN WHICH They are finding new ways to fight ALUMNI 1,058 ‘DISRUPTION’ IS OFTEN SEEN AS A international crime, and overturning decades- old miscarriages of justice through their IN HIGHER DEGREE ACROSS SOURCE OF FEAR AND WORRY. BUT TO courage and tenacity. FLINDERS UNIVERSITY RESEARCHERS – COUNTRIES RESEARCH But our magazine is more than just a December 2018 33 THE ‘BRAVE MINDS’ WHOSE WORK THIS ENROLMENTS COUNTRIES MAGAZINE CELEBRATES – HARNESSING showcase for the remarkable depth and diversity of our research. We hope you will THAT DISRUPTION IS SOMETHING TO find the stories in these pages inspirational, EMBRACE. IT IS A WAY TO CHANGE and that they will encourage you to join us in SA SCIENTIST PEOPLE’S LIVES FOR THE BETTER. our journey of discovery, whether that is as a student, a collaborator or another valued OF THE YEAR member of the Flinders community. Flinders 2012 2013 2015 University is excited to be at the forefront Flinders University researchers are tackling WINNER 5 of the world’s most advanced thinking. the big questions facing society with a scope that is truly breathtaking. New concepts are We are thrilled to be driving the growth TALL POPPY being examined and questioned, received of global knowledge and to be fostering wisdom is being reimagined or rethought, new and better societies around the world. NO.1 SA UNI the past unearthed and the future confronted. SCIENCE FOR OVERALL EXPERIENCE Some are working to understand the sheer AWARDS 2018 wonder of the world around us, while others (THE GOOD UNIVERSITY GUIDE 2019, PUBLIC SA-FOUNDED UNIVERSITIES ONLY) confront current challenges, whether that is the need to reduce energy use and waste, or how we can ensure the digital healthcare PRESIDENT AND AUSTRALIAN UNIVERSITY revolution results in the best outcomes for VICE-CHANCELLOR patients. Our people are drawing lessons from PROFESSOR COLIN J STIRLING 2016 TEACHER OF THE YEAR* the past to contextualise the present, bringing 90% OF OUR new insights, for example, to the richness RESEARCH RATED ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR KAREN BURKE DA SILVA of Indigenous culture. They are discovering WORLD STANDARD OR ABOVE new commercial opportunities in the seas (FLINDERS RATING 89.7%, ROUNDED UP TO 90%. around us, creating high-tech smart homes EXCELLENCE IN RESEARCH FOR AUSTRALIA, 2018) that keep us healthier and happier as we age, and ushering in a new era of personalised medicine. 5 RHODES SCHOLARS 26 FULBRIGHT SCHOLARS RATED 43 ONE FIELDS MEDALLIST IN 1966 WHEN FLINDERS UNIVERSITY WAS ESTABLISHED, FOUNDING VICE-CHANCELLOR PROFESSOR PETER KARMEL STATED IN ASIA-PACIFIC REGION HIS AMBITIONS FOR THE UNIVERSITY ‘WE WANT TO EXPERIMENT, AND EXPERIMENT BRAVELY’. IN THE SPIRIT OF THIS TRADITION, (THE WORLD UNIVERSITY RANKINGS 2019) ONE AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR WE RECOGNISE THE ‘BRAVE MINDS’ OF OUR RESEARCHERS. BILL CONDIE

DEPUTY VICE-CHANCELLOR (RESEARCH) FUTURE PROFESSOR ROBERT SAINT DIRECTIONS FOR FLINDERS RESEARCH

quality research that goes on here, but always government and community organisations Looking to the future, Professor Saint AT A TIME WHEN INDUSTRY ENGAGEMENT WITH LOCAL with scope for further development.” is equally relevant to our research mission.” sees his task as raising the achievements of Flinders research to a much higher Since arriving, Professor Saint has sought This collaboration recently resulted in the RESEARCH HAS NEVER BEEN MORE CRUCIAL, PROFESSOR level. to lift the profile of research in the institution launch of a sports drink, called Prep’d. ROB SAINT IS LOOKING TO POWERFUL COLLABORATIONS as a core part of its mission. He’s set about “It’s a product that has come out of years “All the seeds are there,” he says. “We’ve building areas of research concentration and of research into the effect of different gut significantly changed the way people are AND SCALABLE SOLUTIONS TO DEFINE THE NEXT ERA to increase the University’s engagement with contents on rehydration, but it's now great to approaching research. We are now in a external stakeholders to build the standing see it on the market and being used, initially, position to make a substantial number of OF RESEARCH AT FLINDERS. of its research among the community. by high-performing athletes.” new appointments, which will strengthen existing research activities to take “The Vice-Chancellor and I have worked The University’s industry-facing Tonsley There is nothing Professor Rob Saint loves Despite joining Flinders University in 2015, he didn’t that next step up in demonstrating the very much in concert to encourage the Campus was another critical factor in more than guiding Flinders University’s research fully relinquish his own research until last year. research power that Flinders University development of higher performing areas Professor Saint’s decision to move to Flinders, strategies. But push him a little, and he admits has.” “I had NHMRC funding up until the end of 2017, of focus for research,” he says. and he sees the opportunity it provides to to one regret. and that was in collaboration with a colleague, work directly with industry as being crucial for “In the current research climate, you really While leading the direction of the University’s research Dr Stephen Gregory, whom I’ve worked with very mid-career researchers – a key focus for him. need to be saying to funding organisations, as its Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), he’s had to closely for many years.” to assessors, ‘We are very strong in this area, “There’s a lot of emphasis on early career let go of his own. Ask him if he misses research and Through Dr Gregory, investigations into the we’ll use the money productively if you give researchers and that’s justified, but I think his response sounds a note, almost of bereavement: chromosomal instability of cancer cells continue us the funds to do research.’” the mid-career researchers are a bit of a “Deeply. Deeply,” he says. at Flinders, in the hopes of finding new strategies neglected group,” he says. “There’s a period Something that Professor Saint is particularly Professor Saint’s career as a geneticist took him to fight the disease. where researchers need more targeted proud of is the wide range of research from the University of Adelaide to some of the world’s support than we’ve been giving, to become “Last year, Stephen moved to Flinders and he’s collaborations that Flinders has, not just most distinguished institutions: Stanford University in one of the ‘big fish’, top-level researchers.” continuing that research, so the research goes on. with other universities and research institutes, California, Melbourne’s Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, But…” he says, shaking his head. but with key stakeholders. And that all comes down to research leadership. the CSIRO, Australian National University, and the University of Melbourne. So, what made Professor Saint decide to leave such “For example, our engagement with the “The sort of mid-career transition where a distinguished and beloved career and move to a Southern Adelaide Local Health Network, people might have PhD students, post-docs, He’s been a member of the Prime Minister’s Science, new university? which is responsible for running the or assistants working with them, this requires Engineering and Innovation Council; is the author Flinders Medical Centre where our medical real leadership and the ability to think about of the only Australian tertiary-level biology textbook; “I was attracted by the freshness of the place,” he says. researchers are co-located with the hospital, a field and interpret what the most significant and serves on the board of the South Australian “A new Vice-Chancellor, Professor Colin Stirling, had is critical to our health research success and questions are.” Health and Medical Research Institute. just arrived, and it was a chance to take broad control to the translation of our research into practice,” of a research agenda. I was also aware of the high he says. “Our engagement with industries,

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 7 JOHN PICKRELL Anything really interesting in the insights, along with the fossil emergence of the human blueprint braincase of Rhinodipterus, happened hundreds of millions of years to more accurately PROFESSOR JOHN LONG ago, before our ancestors first crawled reconstruct its brain. onto land, says Flinders palaeontologist This innovation was Professor John Long. That means if significant, as fish brains WHEN we only focus on our recent history to don’t fit snugly into the understand our evolution, we’re too late braincase. The resultant gap to the party. means fossil braincases “Most of the big evolutionary changes between alone aren’t good guidelines INTELLECT the origin of vertebrates and humans really for the shape of the brains happened in the fishes before they left the that once sat inside them. water,” he says. “The origin of limbs, jaws, teeth, The technique allowed for breathing, sexual copulatory reproduction – all a prehistoric brain to be of these things took place in fish, and the rest rigorously reconstructed for WAS BORN was just fine-tuning.” the first time, using computer models and data from both This philosophy guides the work of Professor living animals and fossils. Long’s research group, which is trying to unravel how the human body plan was assembled, while In May 2018, the pair also understanding the fundamental evolutionary published a brain bit ambiguous, but these ones in Poland have changes that carried from fish to limbed reconstruction of a second fish, called distinct digit impressions, so you can tell there vertebrates and ultimately to our own species. Ligulalepis, from 400-million-year-old rocks was a foot or a hand.” RECONSTRUCTING THE BRAINS OF FOSSIL The changes required to walk on land were enormous. “They had to undergo huge structural FISH THAT LIVED 400 MILLION YEARS THE TECHNIQUE ALLOWED FOR A changes to their vertebral column, ribs, AGO IS OFFERING PALAEONTOLOGISTS shoulders, and pelvic girdles to suddenly carry PREHISTORIC BRAIN TO BE RIGOROUSLY this weight and deal with gravity,” she says. UNPRECEDENTED INSIGHTS INTO THE Dr Clement expects to also find changes EARLY EVOLUTION OF OUR OWN BRAINS. RECONSTRUCTED FOR THE FIRST TIME, in the brains. Fossil skulls from across the transition show the eyes moving to the top of the head, which is sensible at the water’s USING COMPUTER MODELS AND DATA surface. The eye socket size also increases, suggesting greater reliance on vision, which may prove to be mirrored within the brains in an FROM BOTH LIVING ANIMALS AND FOSSILS. enlargement of the optic lobe. near Wee Jasper in New South Wales. To this end, he and Flinders Palaeontology “There are just so many questions that arise Group colleague Dr Alice Clement have been Exploring evolutionary changes in these brains from this kind of brain reconstruction data. It’s a studying fossils to reconstruct the brains of fish could reveal when and why certain senses, rich source of information,” says Professor Long. from more than 380 million years ago during such as smell or sight, took precedence and “We can look at the kinds of changes going the Devonian Period. allowed some animals to succeed where across major evolutionary boundaries in early fish.” others failed. “What’s really cool is that you can “I’m really interested in documenting the He suspects that they might find changes in track changes through evolutionary time,” says changes in the brain and braincase in fish over the inner ear canals, important for balance. Dr Clement. “You can see if there are certain the water-to-land transition,” says Dr Clement. Another brain region they will interrogate is regions of the brain that are increasing or “I want to look at the first tetrapods – or land one that is important for sensing light and decreasing in relative size.” animals – and their closest fishy relatives to see daylength, and which probably became more exactly which changes and features appeared In the lungfish, she noticed a gradual increase important to animals moving onto the land. and have then been maintained through to the in part of the forebrain called the telencephalon, Luckily, with several rich Devonian fossil sites human brain.” likely related to the sense of smell. “This in Australia, and Professor Long mounting suggests to me that vision is less important in In 2016, Dr Clement and Professor Long expeditions to Antarctica to collect similar these fish, perhaps because of the murky water published groundbreaking research on the fossils there, they have plenty to work with. they live in, and that’s why they’re relying on beautifully preserved fossil skull of a lungfish sense of smell instead.” “I’ve got beautiful fossils at my disposal,” called Rhinodipterus, from the 385-million-year- says Dr Clement. “You can’t do these sorts old Gogo Formation in Western Australia’s While the earliest well-established fossils of of analyses on just any fossil, but we do have Kimberley region. land-faring limbed fish were found in Greenland quite a few really beautiful three-dimensionally and dated to 380 million years ago, Dr Clement Along with colleagues from Uppsala University preserved fossils that span the time period, says there are other intriguing fossil footprints in Sweden, Dr Clement pioneered a ‘brain- which will really help enlighten how things in Poland that are perhaps 20 million years warping’ technique, whereby she studied the changed over time.” older. “There are plenty of trackways that are a brains of modern lungfish and used these BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 9 The common theme across HANNAH JAMES these studies is finding new ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR NIRANJAN BIDARGADDI ways to empower patients to help themselves. Flinders cardiologist Professor Derek Chew says this is critical. “The digital revolution is going THE FUTURE to democratise medicine, and allow us to build models of care around more accurate clinical decision-making and patient-directed clinical OF HEALTHCARE decision-making.” “Healthcare is all about IT,” he adds. “It’s about getting Depending on whom you’re talking to, the right information to the right person to IS DIGITAL the term ‘digital health’ can arouse either make the right decision. That’s where I think hopes or fears. For some, it evokes the evolution – and revolution – of medicine images of robotic arms carrying out will be. It’s in how we bring more valuable, precision surgery and individually tailored more precise, more predictive information treatments delivered via your smartphone. to the person who is making a decision.” For others, it raises fears of government That person could be a doctor, a nurse, or even surveillance, health data being sold to the the patient. With increased precision in tests for highest bidder, and everyone from your employer imminent heart attacks, along with swifter results WE MIGHT NOT BE CONSULTING to the police knowing when you last contracted and the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the a minor infection. interpretation of those results, Professor Chew ROBOT DOCTORS JUST YET, BUT NEW Researchers and clinicians are working to predicts that the one-size-fits-all approach is TECHNOLOGIES ARE REVOLUTIONISING navigate the future challenges and opportunities on its way out. “YOU CAN’T of using information technology (IT) in the “The ambulance or GP would get your test THE WAY HEALTHCARE IS DELIVERED. delivery of healthcare, and Flinders is at the results back, and tell you, ‘We think you have REPLACE THE forefront. a less than 1% chance of having a heart attack. A recent study led by Associate Professor Do you still want to go to hospital?’ We’ll take Niranjan Bidargaddi at the Flinders Digital Health them to hospital if they want to go, and follow BRAIN, BUT Research Centre used smartwatches and phone up with those who don’t. But it’s potentially apps to correlate users’ physical activities with safer, cheaper care,” he says. YOU CAN GIVE their mental health. If a patient’s behaviour At the base of all these applications is data. seemed unusual – for example, they sat at Data is essential for the AI that Professor PEOPLE TOOLS home all day instead of going out, or they Chew’s patients will soon depend on for a more experienced altered sleep patterns – this accurate diagnosis – the machine learning that TO FILL THE would trigger an intervention. can read test results better than junior doctors, “They might not be Facebooking their buddies and the studies that online tools are based on. GAP THAT THE so much, or they might be sending sombre Public trust in the use of that data has a long emails. If you can deduce those things and way to go, but Professors Maeder and Chew MEMORY LOSS intervene in time, that’s very beneficial,” says believe that education is the key to acceptance, Professor Anthony Maeder, Co-Director of the and they’re confident that acceptance will IS CAUSING – Centre and Chair in Digital Health Systems. come once people see the benefits of electronic One of Professor Maeder’s projects is the health records. THE SAME AS Flinders Assistant for Memory Enhancement “Digital health technology is already here, and (FAME), which is open to participants aged you can deduce better ways to treat subgroups YOU CAN GIVE over 65 who are starting to lose their memory. of patients by observing the data on their health Combining brain-training exercises, an interactive condition and their recovery,” says Professor SOMEONE calendar, and a contacts list, FAME is an iPad Maeder. “You can also deliver interventions by app that combats the most common effects IT to patients, because if the computer knows of memory loss. about them as a patient, then it can customise WHO’S LOST “You can’t replace the brain, but you can give how it’s going to advise them, say, to improve people tools to fill the gap that the memory loss their physical activity.” A LEG AN is causing – the same as you can give someone It’s safe to say, the digital future of health who’s lost a leg an artificial limb,” Professor is looking increasingly bright. ARTIFICIAL Maeder explains. LIMB.” BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 11 Former president of Mitsubishi Motors As companies change the way they make Australia Robert McEniry had just one things, being able to test new processes PRO-VICE CHANCELLOR wish for the company’s vacated plant at is essential to reducing the risks and costs. Tonsley. He wanted this manufacturing The hub’s virtual environment setup allows OF RESEARCH IMPACT legacy to once again benefit Adelaide. manufacturers to design and test new PROFESSOR JOHN SPOEHR production processes and In 2015, this vision became a reality when technologies well before Flinders University moved into its new, $120 implementation. million Tonsley campus, alongside a number of other teaching, government, industry, Professor Spoehr explains startup, and entrepreneurial bodies. that implementing new technologies isn’t Operations at the former Mitsubishi site about replacing jobs. now empower businesses to adopt the Instead, it can introduce next generation of manufacturing – known a wide range of new as Industry 4.0 – for future economic and manufacturing tasks, while employment gains. also reducing the risk of And, as the business of making stuff physical harm to humans. continues to rapidly evolve, “no industry will “Routine and repetitive be left untouched,” says Pro-Vice Chancellor tasks are clearly at risk of Research Impact Professor John Spoehr of loss from automation,” a leading economic and industry analyst. he says. “But the goal The Flinders at Tonsley campus is home should be to provide more

MELISSA LYNE “Other nations have used policy to develop innovative business models and work RATHER THAN DISPLACING JOBS, practices that encourage new forms of production and employment that are aided THESE TECHNOLOGIES INCREASED by technology, not necessarily determined FUTURE by technology,” he explains. “In these nations, PRODUCTIVITY AND QUALITY. robots aren’t simply taking jobs, they’re changing jobs.”

to the Australian Industrial Transformation rewarding, highly-skilled, and better paid The challenge now is for Australia to Institute (AITI) and the Tonsley employment for those impacted. We need significantly scale up the suite of measures MAKERS Manufacturing Innovation (TMI) Hub, already in place and adopt new ones that to ensure that they share the benefits which are helping South Australia gain of Industry 4.0, rather than cut jobs as are capable of achieving change. a competitive edge over other regions. some companies are doing, which is not Professor Spoehr compares this to what’s Global companies such as Siemens, Tesla sustainable.” happening around the world, such as in the and Zeiss, also have operations within the With his work stationed in the former UK and other parts of Europe. There, industrial precinct. Mitsubishi manufacturing plant, Dr Dean transformation is a high priority and is “Manufacturing is still fundamentally the says it’s inspired him to reflect on the backed by significant government investment FLINDERS IS SHORING UP AUSTRALIA’S most important of the economic sectors,” site’s industrial past to inform his vision for in education and training, research and says Dr Mark Dean, a research associate at the future. When in operation, Mitsubishi development, and new facilities. FUTURE BY HELPING BUSINESSES ADOPT AITI. “We take it for granted, but everything introduced robots and computer-aided “This is less about getting technology to NEXT-GENERATION MANUFACTURING. in the built environment is manufactured.” design and manufacturing. businesses, and instead tying it to an overall This means that in order to remain Rather than displacing jobs, these industrial strategy,” says Dr Dean. “This is a WELCOME TO INDUSTRY 4.0: competitive, all manufacturing is under technologies increased productivity and place where innovation is able to grow these intense pressure to transform using advanced quality. industries. The companies here compete THE FOURTH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION. technologies says Professor Spoehr, who led indirectly but collaborate directly.” “We need to use the past as a foundation,” the establishment of the TMI Hub in his other he says. “The optimal outcome is to create As Australia prepares to undergo more role as the Director of AITI. a future of work that’s safe for humans. challenges in manufacturing in the next 20 The technologies being developed and tested Businesses can remain innovative by years than it has in the past 100, our greatest at AITI include robotics, automation, artificial focusing not on how much is manufactured, minds must team up like never before to intelligence (AI), nanotechnology, photonics but on how clever production can be.” find new solutions in areas such as medical and sensing. The Internet of Things, which technology, digital health, renewable energy, Looking to the future creates a network between devices that can and sustainable manufacturing. ‘talk’ to one another, is also a focus. It’s no coincidence that some of the world’s As Professor Spoehr says, “Here at Tonsley, The robot revolution most developed economies have been we are creating the foundation for the country built on the back of manufacturing. The to accelerate the growth of manufacturing In early 2018, the TMI Hub launched progression of society, says Dr Dean, is businesses, as well as rewarding jobs.” BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE with the task of investigating an array of driven by manufacturing. PAGE 13 advanced technologies. BILL CONDIE PROFESSOR AMANDA KEARNEY WORDS MATTER TO ABORIGINAL LIVES

IT WAS IN BRAZIL WHERE ANTHROPOLOGIST PROFESSOR AMANDA KEARNEY’S THINKING ABOUT AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL

PEOPLE, AND THE LANGUAGE WE USE TO DESCRIBE THEIR Many were fleeing the frontier violence that still raged against Aboriginal people, but LIVES, TOOK THE PROFOUND TURN THAT HAS HELPED USHER once in the town, they became increasingly “NOBODY ARTICULATES ABORIGINALITY IN A NEW, OPTIMISTIC AND POSITIVE WAY TO VIEW THE FUTURE dependent on welfare. OR YOUNG ABORIGINALITY AS ‘COOL’ OR The town also became home to four different OF INDIGENOUS CULTURE IN AUSTRALIA. language groups living in different family camps: the Yanyuwa, the Garawa, the AS ATTRACTIVE OR A POSITIVE THING.” Gudanji and the Marra. vanishing before their eyes, but they had The first, funded but the Sidney Myer Professor Kearney studied the work of Yale “I was with academics at the Federal University Carpentaria – an encounter she credits as kicking never lost the sense of esteem and worth Foundation, kicked off in 2008 with the sociologist Jeffrey Alexander and had even of Bahia, who were working with Afro funk and off her career. around being a Yanyuwa person. Yanyuwa families of Borroloola. The jazz groups and bands, and they said to me ‘So, met him. One of the world’s leading social She has returned nearly every year since then, and community did not need to be asked twice. what is cool about being a young Aboriginal theorists, his work looked at how cultural “So I was searching for another language her passion is undimmed. The words tumble out as person in Australia?’” groups come through horrific episodes. better to represent what I saw in day-to-day “Just seeing how people came to terms with she speaks excitedly of the journey of discovery that life where people were trying to thrive again a highly technical, visual language made by “And I thought: it’s amazing, nobody articulates began more than 20 years ago. “I can get on a roll!” But she found the language of ‘cultural on cultural terms that were their own,” she animators sitting far away was breathtaking, Aboriginality or young Aboriginality as ‘cool’ or as she admits. trauma’ he used, and the implicated state says. and the sophisticated way the elders made attractive or a positive thing.” of post trauma, stifling. What was worse, “It was meeting women from this very remote when applied to the Australian context it fed Often this was at odds with the national decisions about what needed to happen to While in Brazil, the idea of black aesthetics and community who had said to me they wanted their into the narrative that, for the most part, cast narrative. safeguard language and knowledge into the cultural roots was positive – even enviable, “but you stories told. Aboriginal peoples in terms of dysfunction. future,” she says. start to realise that young people operate in a space “Which is why events like the the intervention “A lot of the men’s stories had already been recorded, “And hearing people say, ‘Ever since those in Australia where being young and Indigenous would “The language had come out of the were devastating. They cast Aboriginal family but these ladies had said to me, ‘We’re bosses animations came out I can’t get to bed at never be seen as a good thing.” holocaust and particularly violent and horrific life as a problem, and yet all of the people ourselves and we’ve got stories to tell, you should histories and I found it at odds with what I I’ve worked with, their greatest investment is night, the kids are just watching them all That was when she coined the term ‘cultural come up some time’.” was seeing in the community where, on a in their young people’s future.” night’. wounding’, which allows for the positive of ‘healing’, Borroloola has a long and sometimes brutal history. day-to-day basis, people have an incredible even if that healing comes with scar tissue that means Professor Kearney committed to showcasing “And then you’d hear kids singing in It was a far cry from Professor Kearney’s youth, in capacity to just get on with things.” the culture develops as something new. this ingenuity, perhaps best expressed language and singing songlines, and “a very run-of-the-mill, single parent Gold Coast family.” These were people who would tell Professor through an animation project designed to suddenly this knowledge is lively and is being Professor Kearney was an undergraduate when she It was established in 1901 as a colonial welfare Kearney about past massacres, the current preserve Aboriginal languages, culture and transmitted all around the community. There first met Yanyuwa people from the remote Aboriginal outpost, and drew people in until the 1950s. hardship of their lives, the terrible housing, stories in a form that resonates with young is a real sense of pride that this incredible community of Borroloola in the South West Gulf of and their heartbreak at their language people. animation belongs to that community.” BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 15 “THE SHIPBUILDERS WOULD DRILL A HOLE THROUGH THE PLANKING AND THE FRAME, BILL CONDIE AND SEAL THAT WITH A WOODEN PLUG. THEY’D THEN DRIVE NAILED IT! THE NAIL THROUGH INTO THE DIRECTION OF THE GRAIN.”

The find also produced the only examples of “They’re not cast nails, they’re each individually marble ophthalmoi – the ship’s eyes – from hammered. They’re beautiful; the level of an ancient shipwreck. It’s believed that these craftsmanship is something we don’t see today DETECTIVE WORK BY A LEADING FLINDERS MARITIME ‘eyes’ served a combined role as navigation anymore.” aids and to ward off evil. ARCHAEOLOGIST IS REVEALING THE SECRETS OF A SHIP And they were practical, too. “Due to While it was already known that these hammering, they become stronger. You FROM ANCIENT GREECE. AND AT THE HEART OF IT ALL features existed, experts assumed that they hammer them, you heat them, and then you were painted on. “It was always thought that hammer them and heat them again. That can ARE SOME HUMBLE COPPER NAILS. marble was too valuable to put on the bow of increase the strength of copper by 400 to a ship, and that they were probably painted 500%.” on or ceramic,” says Associate Professor van There were likely no time restrictions in terms Duivenvoorde. of the shipbuilding in Ancient Greece, says One hundred-odd copper nails and fragments Associate Professor van Duivenvoorde, of timber around them were found at the because wealthy people would pay for ships site, providing major clues as to the ship’s to be built. “They had a lot of slaves, so time provenance. was not an issue,” she adds. All it took was a handful of nails and a few scraps of timber from the muddy seafloor off the coast “We know those nails were used for attaching While she can’t say for sure where the ship of Turkey for maritime archaeologist Associate the frames to the planking, because they built was built, she did locate where the copper Top to bottom: copper frame nail, under side of one Professor Wendy van Duivenvoorde to build a ships with shell-based construction methods was mined, tracing it to an area in Cyprus. of the marble ophthalmoi showing the lead fastener, fascinating picture of shipbuilding 2,500 years ago. at the time – not with a plank on a frame, as “Of course, that doesn’t mean that the ship cross-section of frame nail. we would today if we were to build a wooden was built there, and we know that a lot of “You take all the clues into consideration. It’s a bit like ship,” Associate Professor van Duivenvoorde ancient copper was mined on the island a crime scene,” she says of the analysis she carried out explains. of Cyprus,” she says. ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR on the remains of the Ancient Greek shipwreck at Tektas Burnu in western Turkey. “You have to look at all the ‘Mortise-and-tenon’ joints were used to The trees that provided WENDY VAN DUIVENVOORDE components as part of the investigation.” connect the planks, which hold everything the timber don’t help together via the insertion of a rectangular piece archaeologists narrow down According to Associate Professor van Duivenvoorde, of wood into opposing holes between two the shipyard’s location either, the nails offer a sense of how the vessel was built planks. The piece of the wood is called the being from a type of pine and how large it was, “and then, in conjunction with the tenon, and the holes in the planks are called and oak that was then found cargo that was found on that particular ship, you gain the mortises. Once the ship’s hull, or ‘shell’, throughout the region around an understanding of the whole civilisation at the time,” was assembled, pine frames were added for the Aegean Sea. “We think it she says. internal strengthening. was built somewhere along The Tektas Burnu ship sank in about 45 metres of “The shipbuilders would drill a hole through the Turkish coast, or the water between 440 and 425 BCE. Despite almost the planking and the frame, and seal that Aegean Turkish coast, but we nothing being left of the soft pine timbers that once with a wooden plug. They’d then drive the don’t know 100% for certain,” made up the hull, the find was important, giving a nail through into the direction of the grain,” she adds. new understanding of craftsmanship at the height says Associate Professor van Duivenvoorde. It’s only fitting that a of the Athenian maritime empire. “We tested that, and it works quite well.” shipwreck discovery of this Each nail was itself something of a work of art, magnitude keeps a few more she adds. secrets up its sleeve.

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 17

ROSANNE BARRETT When Professor Chris Karapetis tested Bowel cancer is Australia’s the impact of a cancer gene on a third-most common type PROFESSOR CHRIS KARAPETIS patient’s potential treatment for bowel of newly diagnosed cancer, cancer, it overturned the worldwide with about 17,000 people medication protocol and ushered in a diagnosed in 2018. Of THE DISCOVERY new era of personalised medicine. these, roughly 5,000 will have an advanced Now, as Director of Medical Oncology Clinical Research at Flinders Cancer Research, metastatic condition, Professor Karapetis says it was heartening where the cancer has to be involved in a trial with such significant spread to other parts of THAT CHANGED the body. While 90% of and lasting outcomes. “It’s good to feel that what you do has an impact,” he says. “This is bowel cancers can be a piece of work that has a real, tangible end treated effectively in the result”. early stages, it remains Australia’s second HOW THE WORLD The research led to treatments that give some deadliest cancer, as it patients with advanced metastatic bowel often goes undetected. cancer an average of six months’ longer survival. And, most importantly, their quality The Flinders team was remaining 58% of patients who had the non- of life is also improved. involved in a clinical TREATS BOWEL trial with 572 advanced bowel cancer mutated KRAS gene, the outcome was more Even patients who do not respond to this patients to determine the effectiveness of positive. These patients saw a significant specific treatment see benefits – their cetuximab for those who had already received increase in their length of survival, from clinicians can determine this in advance, chemotherapy. roughly 4.5 months to 10.5 months. sparing them from invasive and expensive “They’ve got a greater chance of being alive CANCER interventions. Half of these patients received this new antibody therapy, while the other half received in six months, a greater chance of being alive “This was truly practice-changing,” says full support without antibody therapy. in a year, and also a better maintenance of Professor Karapetis. Professor Karapetis and his team tested quality of life,” says Professor Karapetis. The discovery was the result of a worldwide whether patients in each group lived longer, This was the first time in bowel cancer clinical trial, conducted from 2003 to if their cancer growth slowed, and what their treatment that a biomarker – the KRAS 2006 and coordinated by the Australasian quality of life was like during the treatment. gene – could be used to select therapies International Gastrointestinal Trials Group. The study showed that some patients and determine the best, most personalised THE GENETIC TEST FOR BOWEL CANCER THAT LED It sought to determine why some patients with on cetuximab tolerated the treatment well, treatment. advanced bowel cancer were not responding lived longer, had improved symptoms positively to what was otherwise considered After the findings were published in 2008, TO PERSONALISED TREATMENTS FOR PATIENTS. and maintained their quality of life. “It policy-makers recognised its significance a promising new treatment, known as a demonstrated that this treatment was monoclonal antibody therapy. for clinical practice. In 2009, the American effective, but we saw that many patients Society for Clinical Oncology recommended Previously, the only proven treatment to were not benefitting,” says Professor that patients have their KRAS status tested extend the lives of advanced bowel cancer Karapetis. before receiving antibody therapy that targets patients was chemotherapy, and it was not The team wanted to find a way to determine the epidermal growth factor receptor. always effective. in advance who might benefit, and who might While the trial has generated significant not. They had seen results from other studies “This treatment was an entirely new class outcomes for patients themselves, it has suggesting that patients who had a type of of medicine,” says Professor Karapetis. also saved health systems around the world bowel cancer with a mutated version of the The new wave of therapies millions of dollars. Multiple studies highlighted so-called KRAS gene – part of the cancer’s Antibody drugs, called cetuximab and how KRAS gene testing has avoided epidermal growth factor receptor pathway – panitumumab, can inhibit cancer growth by unnecessary, expensive treatments for might not respond to the new antibody drugs. blocking growth signals from a particular type patients who wouldn’t have benefited anyway. of protein on the surface of the cancer cells. Real-life results Professor Karapetis is encouraged by the This protein is known as the epidermal growth Professor Karapetis led the study that tested trial’s outcomes, and urges all Australians to factors receptor. the effect of the KRAS mutation on the test themselves for bowel cancer. Easy-to-use antibody treatment response. These drugs are part of a new wave of screening kits are available and free for people personalised medicines that are designed In 42% of patients, a KRAS mutation was over the age of 50. to match the specific patient. found in the cancer, and in this group, the “This test can save lives,” he says. antibody did not provide any benefit. In the BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 19 1 3 4 5

The Medical Device Partnering Program (MDPP) at Flinders University is an ‘ideas incubator’, which takes great concepts 2 4 for new medical technology and finds LIGHT THERAPY GLASSES, RE-TIMER CAS SPLINT the right mix of clinicians, academics and

manufacturers to turn them into real products. Flinders sleep psychologists Emeritus Professor When director of Fluoro Medical Scott “We identify six to eight ideas a year that Leon Lack and Dr Helen Wright study the effect Blackburn broke both arms and a leg, he was have the most potential to make a difference,” of light on our daily rhythms. They realised that stunned that paramedics used simple pieces of says MDPP Director and biomedical engineer exposure to specific kinds of blue-green light cardboard to immobilise his limbs. This inspired could be useful for reducing jetlag and treating him to invent the easy-to-use CAS Splint. 2 Professor Karen Reynolds. both insomnia and a type of depression called “If somebody’s got a suspected fracture, it’s seasonal affective disorder, as it stimulates The program launched 10 years ago, when very easy to assemble, enabling you to quickly the production of melatonin – a hormone that Professor Reynolds was becoming frustrated keep the limb immobile,” says Professor controls circadian rhythms. The MDPP helped that new medical inventions “would end up Reynolds. The splint is cheap, waterproof, fits the pair develop prototype light-therapy glasses. JOHN PICKRELL sitting in the lab, not going anywhere”. into a standard first-aid kit, and doesn’t need to “The glasses work by shining light onto the be removed during X-rays. It’s also disposable So, she created a ‘one-stop-shop’, bringing back of your retina, and readjust your body or reusable. The MDPP helped Blackburn together inventors, end-users, medical clock,” Professor Reynolds explains. The perfect the device by testing it with end-users researchers, clinicians and small companies prototype was enough to convince investors and providing vital design modifications. to connect the dots and smooth the journey of its value, and the Re-Timer Glasses are now The CAS Splint retails for $24.90. on the market. They retail for $299, are available 5 REVOLUTIONARY of exciting tech to market. Here’s a selection Learn more at www.fluoromedical.com in 40 countries, and are used by sports teams of the MDPP’s biggest successes. such as the Socceroos.

Learn more at www.re-timer.com

MEDICAL 5 1 CANCER MARGIN DETECTION PROBE MAXM SKATE

3 EZY-AIM DISTAL TARGETING DEVICE, AUSTOFIX When doctors perform breast-cancer surgery, TECHNOLOGIES To recover from a knee replacement, patients it can be difficult to determine if they’ve removed must perform rehabilitation exercises. But all the affected cells. “The only way of knowing orthopaedic surgeon Dr Matthew Liptak noticed To fix fractures, surgeons sometimes need to is to take a small tissue sample and look at that some of his patients weren’t recovering insert a pin into the centre of a limb bone. “The the margins,” says Professor Reynolds. “If they as quickly as others. The problem was that trouble is, they’re never exactly sure where the haven’t got it all, the patient has to come back THAT ARE end is, and they need to put a screw through they weren’t sticking to their motion and for follow-up surgery.” strengthening exercises. to hold it in place,” says Professor Reynolds. Dr Erik Schartner and Professor Mark The solution he invented was the Maxm Skate To line things up, they must take a series of Hutchinson from the University of Adelaide – a roller-skate-like device that straps to the X-rays, exposing patients to radiation. As an wanted a more efficient solution, so they alternative, Adelaide-based company Austofix CHANGING LIVES foot, easing movement. The MDPP helped him invented the Cancer Margin Detection Probe, invented a device that allows surgeons to develop sensors that measure the angles of the which recognises cancerous tissue by its pH identify where the end of the pin is, and where user’s knee inside the device, which is sent to levels. This means that surgeons can find the the anchoring screw must be inserted. both the user’s smartphone and their clinician edges of the tumour during surgery, removing for monitoring. The MDPP collaborated with end-users to the need for additional procedures. design and create a prototype of this device. Enabling patients to track their progress has The MDPP assembled a team, including Surgeons have lauded the product – now sold FLINDERS’ INNOVATIVE MEDICAL DEVICE PARTNERING PROGRAM been a great motivational tool to encourage doctors, mathematicians and biomedical in 13 countries – for being easy to use, and perseverance, Dr Liptak found. The Maxm Skate engineers, to build a prototype probe and IS OVERSEEING THE RAPID DEVELOPMENT OF A SLEW OF the MDPP and Austofix are now working on is now being tested in clinical trials. a second-generation Ezy-Aim that is controlled demonstrate its function in an operating FUTURISTIC HEALTHCARE TECHNOLOGIES. Learn more at www.maxmskate.com.au using a smartphone or tablet. theatre. That allowed Dr Schartner and Professor Hutchinson to attract significant Learn more at www.austofix.com.au funding for further development.

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE Watch this space. PAGE 21

Learn more at mdpp.org.au DR WILSON HOPES TO ENGAGE NGARRINDJERI MORE WIDELY IN THEIR HERITAGE, AND AS INDIGENOUS LIAISON OFFICER OF THE AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, HE WANTS TO ENCOURAGE GREATER INDIGENOUS INVOLVEMENT AUSTRALIA-WIDE IN ABORIGINAL AND TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER HERITAGE.

A discovery that came from Dr Chris Indigenous involvement Australia-wide in Wilson’s decade-long study of 100 shell Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage. midden sites along the Murray River is One focus is inspiring students to undertake so significant, the National Museum of postgraduate and undergraduate degrees. Australia (NMA) is clamouring to include it “There are people out on country who do this in an upcoming exhibit. kind of work, but they are not formally qualified,” JOHN PICKRELL The 35-year-old Ngarrindjeri man – who in 2017 he says. “I want to engage with colleagues became the first Aboriginal Australian to earn a about how we might encourage young people PhD in archaeology – discovered an ‘otolith’, or to get those qualifications.” fish ear bone, from a Murray cod among a wealth He is also a chief investigator with the of evidence captured in these midden sites. The National Indigenous Research and Knowledges sites tell of a thriving Ngarrindjeri community that Network, which includes members from 50 has been hunting and foraging in the area for PAST Aboriginal nations and 21 universities. Its at least 8,500 years. goal is to swell the ranks of highly skilled and Murray cod today are no more than 1.8 m qualified Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander in length, but the size of the otolith Dr Wilson researchers. found suggests a fish at least 2.2 m long. PERSPECTIVES In addition to these many projects, Dr Wilson “It’s good evidence that the river system at that continues to be involved with repatriating time, 5,000 years ago, was healthy enough to Aboriginal remains to Ngarrindjeri land, and has have fish of great size and age,” he says. even been asked to collaborate with a French Now a senior lecturer in the Flinders College string quartet on a composition involving FROM A PIONEER of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, Ngarrindjeri themes. he’s seeking Ngarrindjeri community permission “I’ve been asked by a lot of colleagues to get for the otolith to be displayed in an NMA involved with projects,” says Dr Wilson, who environmental histories exhibition in 2020. has some busy years ahead. In demand for his Indigenous perspective and archaeological expertise, Dr Wilson is also working with the South Australian DR CHRIS WILSON Maritime Museum on the involvement of FLINDERS PIONEERING ABORIGINAL ARCHAEOLOGIST, Aboriginal peoples in whaling and sealing. NGARRINDJERI MAN CHRIS WILSON, IS IN HIGH DEMAND. He recently uncovered an unexpected link to his own family history as part of that research. “My family has a strong connection to whales, so I want to explore that further,” he says. Dr Wilson hopes to engage Ngarrindjeri more widely in their heritage, and as Indigenous liaison officer of the Australian Archaeological Association, he wants to encourage greater BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 23 BILL CONDIE on potentially incorrect ‘expert’ evidence, leading to wrongful convictions. “Clearly, being sent to prison for something you haven’t done is a nightmare to the individual, and HOW FLINDERS utterly abhorrent in a free society,” says Dr Moles. He and Associate Professor Sangha were met with deep reluctance to change the status quo. “Strangely, the principle of double jeopardy – the longstanding legal principle that no one can be RESEARCHERS charged twice for the same crime – became our ally,” Dr Moles explains. The principle of double jeopardy was being re-examined in Australia at the time, in the light CHANGED of several cases where evidence that might have resulted in a conviction was not heard in the original trial. The law was changed so that, in some cases, where there was fresh, compelling evidence, AUSTRALIA’S a retrial could be ordered. Associate Professor Bibi Sangha and Dr Robert Moles. “So, the argument we made was that, if the prosecution can have a second go, why can’t the convicted person?” says Dr Moles. RIGHTS OF The careful language and demanding tests “CLEARLY, BEING SENT TO PRISON FOR SOMETHING APPEAL LAWS YOU HAVEN’T DONE IS A NIGHTMARE TO THE INDIVIDUAL, AND UTTERLY ABHORRENT IN A FREE SOCIETY.” FOREVER Associate Professor Bibi Sangha and Associate Professor Sangha’s and Dr Moles’ used in cases of double jeopardy provided a Dr Robert Moles – quiet revolutionaries long fight to allow old cases to be re-opened. path that could overcome the arguments against at Flinders University – made history in allowing a free-for-all in appeals. Less than a decade ago, appeals to re-open old 2013, with the establishment of a new cases were almost never allowed, under a long- From 2007, with help from Flinders University statutory right of appeal for criminal cases. established legal principle in Australia. staff, the researchers ran an extensive media This new right has already resulted in three campaign to explain the problem to the “Whenever you took a case back to court that THEIR TIRELESS CRUSADE AGAINST convictions being overturned, but it was a Australian public, and began further research had already gone to its normal appeal, the court movement that the legal establishment in into miscarriages of justice, engaging with would not easily re-open it,” says Associate MISCARRIAGES OF JUSTICE TURNED Australia fought every step of the way. other jurisdictions with similar experiences. Professor Sangha. “And it did not matter how MORE THAN 100 YEARS OF ESTABLISHED “Miscarriages of justice are going to upset a lot compelling the fresh evidence was.” In November 2012, the South Australian of powerful people,” says Dr Moles. “The trials Government presented a Bill, which was adopted This meant that there were cases slipping through LAW ON ITS HEAD, GIVING HOPE TO are costly and long, and then someone comes unanimously by the parliament and came into the cracks. THOSE JAILED FOR CRIMES THEY along and suggests that the conviction may be effect in May 2013, allowing for appeals where wrongful. Well, there are a lot of people who When the researchers took the Keogh case to there was “fresh and compelling” evidence that DIDN’T COMMIT. don’t want to hear that.” the High Court in 2007, the judges acknowledged might give rise to a finding that there had been the potential for a miscarriage of justice, and a “substantial miscarriage of justice”. The case that started it all was that of Henry noted that the law could be changed. Keogh, a banker jailed erroneously for 26 years Similar legislation has since been enacted in in 1994 for the murder of his fiancée. Keogh Although, at the time, their hands were tied by Tasmania, and is currently before the parliament spent 21 years behind bars before walking free the existing law. in Western Australia. in 2015, receiving $2.57 million in compensation Associate Professor Sangha and Dr Moles As former Justice of the High Court Michael Kirby from the government. had began their work in 2002, collaborating noted: “Sometimes in Australia, principle triumphs New evidence had saved Keogh, but that with experts such as forensic scientists and over complacency and mere pragmatism”. evidence would not have been heard without pathologists to identify cases that had relied BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 25 NICK CARNE GOING DEEP

DRIVERLESS CARS MAY HAVE CAPTURED OUR IMAGINATION, BUT AUTONOMOUS MARINE VEHICLES HAVE EVEN BIGGER POTENTIAL FOR CHANGE, BOTH ABOVE AND BELOW THE WATERLINE.

Imagine being able to watch over vehicle (AUV) that works just as well – or even happening, and you give these to the vehicle Australia’s vast coastline, map the ocean better – than its human counterparts. so it can come up with its own mission plan,” floor, monitor fish farms and dive deep Professor Sammut explains. The first is autonomy. AUVs have one major to repair a subsea oil rig – all without advantage over driverless cars in that there “Then you might say you want it to do certain putting anyone to sea, let alone in danger. are fewer things to collide with – notably tasks, but how much fuel does it have? How As Director of the Flinders Centre for Maritime people. But at the same time, there are also much will it consume to go against the Engineering, Control and Imaging, Professor no designated routes (i.e. roads) to follow and, current? It has to work out how many of its Karl Sammut and his team are developing the more problematically, GPS and wi-fi don’t work tasks it can achieve.” technologies to make this a reality. underwater. This means you have to Conditions can change dynamically find alternative ways to provide guidance, so “The aim is to create autonomous vehicles, underwater, which means the vehicle has to be the vehicle can figure out where it is and where particularly underwater vehicles, that can able to decide for itself what it’s going to do it’s heading. actually think for themselves, not just obey and how to come back safely. instructions,” he says. This brings us to the second key component: The big challenge now is to develop communication back the other way, so the “Basic mission planning is relatively easy, vehicles that have enough endurance to stay vehicle can reliably and continuously transmit but once you start developing a vehicle that submerged long enough do useful work, data. can sense and understand environmental because at some point, their batteries will conditions and be able to develop and change “By its very nature the communications system run low. Developing docking stations where its own mission plans, the planning becomes underwater is poor,” says Professor Sammut. AUVs can recharge by themselves – and the more complex. We have to be able to rely on “We can only communicate with a vehicle autonomous guidance systems that enable what it has decided, so we can know that it’s using an acoustic modem, which has the same them to dock – is one of the main research going to make a good decision and come back bandwidth as the old telephone modems. activities at Flinders. safely.” You’re never going to be able to send video The ultimate aim for Professor Sammut and back, so you have no idea what the vehicle is It’s an area that’s fascinated Professor Sammut his team is to develop vehicles that can get ‘seeing’.” “THE AIM IS TO CREATE AUTONOMOUS for more than a decade, but in the early days it work done unassisted. So, rather than having was difficult to get traction in Australia. Funding “You can use sonar, but then the vehicle needs a submarine-welding robot controlled via cable agencies understood the value from a defence to be able to interpret what it’s seeing and by a human on the surface, the vehicle has the VEHICLES, PARTICULARLY UNDERWATER perspective, but failed to see the real potential make sense of it,” he adds. “So that’s where all smarts to do the welding itself. of these ‘smart’ boats and submersibles. the research is in terms of adding in artificial Research is already underway in this and many VEHICLES, THAT CAN ACTUALLY THINK intelligence: the capability to understand what Fortunately, attitudes are changing, and other areas, and it’s anyone’s guess as to it sees, then make decisions.” Flinders is one of the leading universities in what’s coming up next. FOR THEMSELVES, NOT JUST OBEY Australia involved in maximising this potential. The third component is mission guidance, “We haven’t even started to discover how far Professor Sammut’s team is funded by both including navigation and control, which is an we can go with these things,” says Professor INSTRUCTIONS.” state and federal agencies, and is collaborating area of focus for the Flinders team. The key Sammut. “The technology has changed rapidly with national and international companies on here is to build a vehicle that can move on its in terms of sensors and battery capability. The major Australian defence projects. own both safely and with purpose. Pictured: Professor Karl Sammut horizon is rapidly expanding for these kinds of He identifies three key factors for success “You have a map of the area. You have some potential applications.” when building an autonomous underwater knowledge of the currents and other things

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 27 NICK CARNE CLEAN, GREEN CHEMICAL CRUSADER

MEET THE PIONEERING PROFESSOR WHO’S HELPING INDUSTRIES SWITCH TO CHEAP, ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY TECHNOLOGIES TO REDUCE ENERGY USE AND WASTE.

Professor Colin Raston and his colleagues made “We can use it to cut carbon nanotubes without using international headlines in 2015 when they proved the chemicals, exfoliate graphene from graphite without impossible was possible – you can, in fact, unboil an egg. chemicals, and to make graphene oxide with zero waste – which is a big deal,” he adds. For Professor Raston, a focus since moving But Professor Raston reckons he’s done even better work from the University of Western Australia to the since. That’s not an idle boast, it’s just a reflection of how Using it to unboil an egg – by refolding the proteins into “WHY HAVEN’T WE BEEN TOLD ABOUT Flinders College of Science and Engineering important and valuable this ‘unboiling’ technology is, and the state found prior to cooking – was a nice bit of theatre, in 2013 has been scalability: how he can scale will continue to be, for many different industries. and not surprisingly won an international Ig Nobel Prize in GREEN CHEMISTRY BEFORE, WHERE up green processes developed in the lab to an 2015. As the Ig Nobels describe themselves, they aren’t The Vortex Fluid Device (VFD) he invented to pass the industrial level. about crazy or pointless science, but about “honouring time on a 15-hour flight has revolutionised flow chemistry, CAN WE FIND OUT MORE INFORMATION?” achievements that make people laugh, then think”. And His lab has already published more than in which chemical processes occur in a continuous flowing Professor Raston has been making people think over It was this that encouraged him to persevere. in the US has since been honoured by their 60 papers on the use of the VFD, and is stream. The VFD can rapidly create a range of chemicals his whole career. governments for their contributions to the collaborating with other universities in Australia, in water and other non-toxic liquids, significantly Fortunately, Professor Raston found some industry. He was appointed an Officer of the the US and Europe. It has two joint patents reducing the cost and environmental harm in a range The VFD brings together his two passions: scientific like-minded souls to work with. In 1991, Order of Australia (AO) in 2016. with the University of California, Irvine, focused of chemical processes. innovation and green chemistry. For more than 20 years two scientists from the US’s Environmental on the multi-billion-dollar pharmaceuticals he’s been championing the importance of chemists Protection Agency (EPA) released their “It’s all happened in the last couple of It looks and is deceptively simple to use. All you see is industry, not to mention a number of other developing products and technologies that don’t create 12 Principles of Green Chemistry. They then years,” he says. “Now there are lots of a tube that spins at very high speeds and at a variety of patents, too. large amounts of waste or require unnecessary energy in invited him to represent Australia at a high- international conferences.” angles – but it has created a new paradigm for how things their production. “Green chemistry is all about reducing powered roundtable meeting in Washington, Things are now moving rapidly. In June 2018, are done in the chemical and biological sciences, as well Most significantly, it’s shifted the mindset, the negative impact on the environment,” he says. DC in 1998, which was designed to get Flinders University and ASX-listed company as materials processing. he says, particularly with the younger people thinking. First Graphene formed 2D Fluidics – a In the early days, there were many cynics who doubted generation of scientists. Whereas in the past, “You can make complex organic molecules. You can business that will both produce environmentally the value of spending time and effort on developing more Since then, more sustainable chemical a chemist might have used a highly toxic use it for drug delivery, for making tools for imaging. It safe supplies of high-grade graphite and make sustainable chemical practices. “I thought, at one stage, practices have become not just a reality, but organomercury compound to solve a problem, covers food processing, we’ve got projects going in wine the VFD technology commercially available. my career was going to go down the gurgler,” Professor the accepted norm, required in most grant now they’d think twice. “They’d say, ‘Hang processing, and I’m just going through the first paper Raston admits. “But the younger generation were saying applications. Professor Raston says that on, as chemists we’re supposed to be able to “It’s easy to use – just plug and play,” says on fish oil encapsulation at nanometre dimensions,” ‘Why haven’t we been told about green chemistry before, nearly everyone who attended the roundtable come up with alternatives,’” he says. Professor Raston. says Professor Raston. where can we find out more information?’”

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 29 PROFESSOR ANDREW GOLDSMITH

LAETITIA LAUBSCHER “THE GLOBAL DEMAND FOR RECREATIONAL DRUGS HAS HAD AN EXTRAORDINARY IMPACT THE CHANGING ON CRIMINALITY AND LAW ENFORCEMENT AND THE SCALE FACE OF GLOBAL OF CRIMINALITY IN COUNTRIES SECURITY ACROSS THE GLOBE.” There are two major challenges in tackling The current model now used to combat Flinders is now running a longitudinal study on transnational crime: bureaucratic issues, transnational crime is not entirely fit for purpose, the role of the internet in recruiting adolescents such as the division of responsibility between even when there are successful arrests and into crime, as well as an interview-based study agencies in different jurisdictions and even prosecutions. looking at offenders’ relationships with guns. within the same jurisdiction; and the effects of “The big investment is in law enforcement – the The insights will be crucial for Australia in its cyberspace, which make tackling transnational attempt to deter and prosecute offenders,” says efforts to enhance global security, while also crime particularly difficult. TRANSNATIONAL CRIME HAS GROWN EXPONENTIALLY, Professor Goldsmith. “But it hasn’t stopped the protecting Australian communities. “The evolution of the internet – social media rapid replacement of those openings by other “There’s a lot that’s going on offshore that technologies, encryption technologies, digital groups. Police increasingly say that in some THANKS TO GLOBALISATION, THE BOOMING ILLICIT DRUG TRADE we don’t consider or appreciate enough, banking technologies – have all created new of these areas, ‘We can’t arrest our way out but that’s the case equally at home,” says AND THE EMERGENCE OF NEW CYBERTECHNOLOGY. pathways, new skill sets, new opportunities,” of these problems.’” Professor Goldsmith. says Professor Goldsmith. Research efforts by Professor Goldsmith and others are key to analysing both the efficacy of “Ice is brought from China into Australia and Professor Andrew Goldsmith started As Strategic Professor in Criminal Justice and Director This has led to the emergence of new the current enforcement measures taken, and sold by motorcycle gangs, or distributed by investigating transnational crime more than two of the Centre for Crime Policy and Research at types of criminals, as well as new criminal to understand the drivers and underlying causes them across rural and regional Australia. The decades ago, after having witnessed first-hand Flinders University, he is also co-editor of the Australian methods, such as the Mafia using encryption of the crimes themselves. The hope is that, effects on families as well as individuals is quite and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, and has technologies to conceal their communications the impact of the drug war in Colombia. with better understanding, we can address the striking. There’s a connection between harmful authored numerous journal articles, reports, chapters from law enforcement. issues in a more holistic and preventative way. things in our own backyard and transnational He’d been invited to the South American nation after and books on the subject. members of the Colombian Ministry of Defence read crime.” While transnational crime is keeping Professor his book, Complaints Against the Police: The Trend to Goldsmith busy today, the concept is a relatively new External Review, and invited him to assist in their police one in terms of how governments around the world reform process. are dealing with it. Many of the events now portrayed in the Netflix hit The United States first recognised transnational crime Narcos occurred while Professor Goldsmith was in in the mid-1970s, but it wasn’t until 1995 – around Colombia. He met the real Attorney-General Pablo the time that Professor Goldsmith was in Colombia – de Greiff and Rosso José Serrano, who became the that the UN issued its official definition as “offences General of the National Police and a fundamental whose inception, prevention, and/or direct or indirect player in dismantling the notorious Cali Cartel. effects involved more than one country”. It identified 18 categories of transnational crime, including human, When on the frontline in Colombia, Professor drug and arms trafficking. Goldsmith realised that more research was needed on transnational crime, which was a relatively Since 1995, transnational crime has grown underappreciated criminal activity at the time. exponentially, spurred on by globalisation, “You can’t talk about police reform in a country like communication and mass migration. The cost of Colombia without reckoning with the enormous transnational organised crime is estimated to be about distraction of, and effort involved in, fighting the drug 3.6% of the global economy, with about 20% of that coming from the illicit drug trade. war,” he says. “The global demand for recreational drugs has The former lawyer is now considered a leading expert had an extraordinary impact on criminality and law in the field. enforcement, and the scale of criminality in countries BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE across the globe,” says Professor Goldsmith. PAGE 31 TRUST IN AN JEFFREY BLEICH ERA OF FAKES

A NEW FLINDERS RESEARCH CENTRE IS SETTING OUT TO REBUILD DEMOCRATIC VALUES

Because, he says, the ‘problem space’ is not Flinders University has launched an “Our ideological opponents have seen that technological disruption has created an unique to one country or the other, “it is one innovative new research centre designed weakness – and they have acted – and the opportunity in the short-term to exploit we share and perhaps there is a ‘solution to shore up trust in democratic values consequences are disruptive and destructive others. But doing that inevitably imperils long- “IT’S NOT JUST A MATTER OF LEARNING space’ that we can both share”. in an era of disinformation, deep fakes for democratic societies and the values that we term peace, and has always produced wars, and compromised electoral campaigns. hold.” economic collapse and failure. The people THE LESSONS OF HISTORY, BUT ALSO But in order to flourish, not just from a funding who built the international liberal order were perspective, Ambassador Bleich says all The Jeff Bleich Centre for the US Alliance in The centre’s work will seek solutions to this and willing to make sacrifices, and act in a far- stakeholders must become engaged. Digital Technology, Security and Governance to chart a course for the future. ACTING NOW TO PROTECT FUTURE sighted way; rebuilding their adversaries, (JBC) is named for a former US Ambassador “Right now the biggest challenge is not simply “We cannot again allow technological change developing trustworthy markets, forging to Australia, who is patron of the project and GENERATIONS. EVERY MASSIVE for the government to act,” he says, “but for to outpace our answers to technological agreements about dangerous technologies will play an ongoing role in its operation and business and the government to act together change,” says Professor DeBats. and fashioning a rules-based order.” development. TECHNOLOGICAL DISRUPTION HAS and offer a positive vision for the future. “We cannot leave people behind who are “It will focus on restoring trust and integrity “I think the lesson from history is not just The public will not trust government or tech vulnerable and who are frightened, not just in the digital age,” says Ambassador Bleich, ‘don’t make the same mistakes’ but, make CREATED AN OPPORTUNITY IN THE until they see everyone at the table together for themselves but for their children. adding that the alliances that built the the choice now to sacrifice and serve for the working toward the common good.” next generation,” he says. international liberal world order need to adapt “And that is the most important mission SHORT TERM TO EXPLOIT OTHERS.” “The best things we have ever built in society to these new technologies. “Our freedom of this centre.” “My other big lesson at Flinders is that when The research program will work with the AI start-ups, and assist in expanding Flinders’ – including my home town of Silicon Valley – and our security depend on it.” Jeff Bleich, who is now based in San Francisco, Don has a vision, don’t stand in the way of it, major defence initiatives being developed in international collaboration with California have not come from just one sector; they’ve While technology holds the promise of was appointed as ambassador to Australia by just go along for the ride.” South Australia as well as major industry players universities, companies and institutes. come from the public sector and the private universal access to information, it has also President Obama in 2009 and held the post with a large investment in the future of security sector and the not-for-profit sector and the The initial focus of the JBC will be the analysis Professor DeBats says it is an opportunity emerged as a powerful disruptive force through 2013. He is a longstanding friend of – Australian banks, and legal, data and ICT research sector, all coming together to try and of the strategic social science implications for Flinders to continue to fulfil what it set out according to Professor Don DeBats, Head Flinders and received an honorary doctorate companies, both in Australia and in California. solve a problem.” of new technologies with respect to the to do 50 years ago as a “new and innovative of American Studies at Flinders University. from the University in March, 2014. Australia-United States defence and security Ambassador Bleich’s Californian link and close university”. The centre combines strengths in Professor DeBats believes the JBC has a “And the consequences of this have been Ambassador Bleich, who is also chairman of relationship. ties to initiatives in the US state around cyber the social sciences with those of technology. good chance of achieving that. frightening,” he says. the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board in the research and security (including water security) In this, the centre will capitalise on the existing “We have an exciting, creative program that “We need to anticipate change and prepare US, draws on history to explain why he agreed will not only benefit the JBC, but also the “It is so easy when there has been rapid collaborative relationship with the Defence brings together some of the strengths of our society, our people and the children for a to help establish the JBC. National Centre for Ground Water Research and technological change for trust to be eroded, Science and Technology group (DST) in cyber Flinders University,” Professor DeBats says. changed future so they are not afraid of it but Training based at Flinders, and South Australia’s for people not to trust one another, to not “It’s not just a matter of learning the research projects, and it will extend Flinders’ embrace it, enjoy it, and see the opportunity, collaborative Goyder Institute for Water “And we hope that the young people who will trust people who are somewhat different lessons of history, but also acting now to social science research capacity in blockchain not a threat. Research. These ties will also help to extend take over this relationship between the United from them. protect future generations. Every massive applications to defence. Flinders’ strengths in autonomous vehicles and States and Australia will benefit from this kind “In that confident space they can trust one of perspective.” another and not be divided.” BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 33 HANNAH JAMES It’s guaranteed to happen to every With this shift from a private, family matter our communities. Now, information is much single one of us, but talking about death to something often reliant on community more accessible and much more immediate. doesn’t come easily to the average assistance, Australians are becoming more We get it from TV, from our phones, through Australian. A Flinders University project open about the whole process of ageing the internet and social media. People are is helping to change all that. and dying. discovering different ways of communicating and understanding, which bring with them CareSearch is a world-first resource designed “In the past four or five years, it’s become THE WILDLY new ways of discussing this.” to educate health professionals about palliative more normal to talk about death and dying in care, as well as members of the public, Australia, because it’s affecting more people It’s hoped that with more open conversations including caregivers, patients and their families. within the community,” says Professor Tieman. about ageing and death, and a greater “It’s evidence-based – that’s really important,” understanding of how we respond to it, POPULAR says Director, Professor Jenifer Tieman. CareSearch can help answer bigger-picture questions such as, can we get back to being In the 10 years since its launch, CareSearch CAN WE GET comfortable with dying in our own homes? has grown far beyond a simple informational resource. It now attracts 100,000 visitors per BACK TO BEING “A lot of dying is occurring in hospitals, month, and with thousands downloading its with interventions almost up to the point of PROJECT THAT’S apps and completing its Dying2Learn MOOC COMFORTABLE death,” says Professor Tieman. “The question (or Massive Open Online Course), it’s reached becomes, ‘How has this happened? Would far beyond the palliative care community and WITH DYING normalising dying have allowed that person to into the world of the healthy and curious. die spending time with their family, rather than in hospital beds?’” DEMYSTIFYING Professor Tieman has a few ideas about how IN OUR OWN it came to be such a runaway success. The success of CareSearch has attracted plenty of attention, with support and funding "First, the way our society deals with death HOMES? from the Australian Government and a range and dying has undergone a major change “There are death cafes, where people get of partnerships such as with End of Life of late, given our ageing population and the together over a cup of tea and share their Directions for Aged Care (ELDAC), which DEATH fact that more people are living with chronic, stories; there are online courses building connects people from palliative care, aged progressive diseases. This means Australians death literacy; and the Groundswell project care and primary care. are more likely to want – and need – to even hosts an annual ‘Dying to Know Day’. engage with content around the topic." This suggests we are creating new rituals It’s also enabled the Flinders team to further expand into aged care with palliAGED – "In addition, if we look back centuries ago, and new understandings as a community another online resource, which provides death primarily happened at home. But around death and dying.” palliative care evidence to the aged care during the 20th century, death was rapidly The second factor Professor Tieman cites community and apps for GPs and nurses. outsourced to hospitals." for the success of CareSearch is its ease THANKS TO THIS UNIQUE These technologies place Flinders University PROFESSOR JENNIFER TIEMAN of access. Being online, it’s accessible 24/7, “One or two generations ago, people were at the forefront of the issue in Australia. ONLINE RESOURCE, dying earlier from disease or in wars, and it which is important considering sickness But the main focus, Professor Tieman says, is was much more visible in the community and and death don’t keep office hours. always on the user. “What keeps us grounded THE TOPIC OF DEATH IS to families,” Professor Tieman explains. “Much The project is technologically innovative, too, is thinking about what will help people who are of that context has now gone, because we’ve and continually evolving. BECOMING LESS TABOO dealing with existential crises: living, caring, had such success with medical intervention. “We’re already figuring out how to incorporate grieving and dying.” And so we’re having to rediscover dying in AND MORE DINNER PARTY chatbots, and how to use the power of a different way.” CONVERSATION. technology to create better access with, say, This is crucial, she adds, when we consider voice-activated software,” says Professor Australia’s ageing population. Rather than Tieman. “We’re looking at how we can being solely a family responsibility, caring maintain the quality of the information and for the elderly is now falling to government its trustworthiness, using these expanding and private services, as adult children are options.” becoming more geographically mobile, “We also need to reflect how people are and families with two working parents are learning and finding information,” she adds. becoming the norm, meaning they have less “Once upon a time, we learned about time to devote to care. things from our doctors, our churches and

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 35 PROFESSOR WEI ZHANG JANE NICHOLLS The CMBD is developing clean, sustainable Another of Professor technologies for existing operations, Zhang’s concepts is a while also inventing advanced processing calcium supplement, to be technologies and products for new developed in a collaboration industries. Professor Zhang has a laser with the CSIRO. “One in focus on immediate business development, six children in Australia MARINE and ambitious plans for “Australia’s future are lactose-intolerant dream” of establishing new job-creating and cannot get sufficient industries for marine bioproducts. calcium from dairy products,” he says. “South Australia has almost 15% of the BIOTECHNOLOGY: world’s recorded diversity for red and brown It’s important to consume seaweeds, which are the most commercially the required nutrients, but valuable species. But we don’t have endless it’s difficult to get children quantities to use for commercial production,” to eat things they don’t like, he explains. “It’s important to develop he adds. “We needed to THE NEXT WAVE technology that’s sustainable and conserves make it tasty and edible, the resources and diversity.” rather than via capsules or tablets, because they hate Those priorities are at the heart of the them.” CMBD’s approach, as well as pursuing energy-efficient and water-saving methods. The Flinders team combined extracts from THE GOOD NEWS FOR AUSTRALIA brown seaweed and minerals from lobster “When we work with industry partners, we shells – a seafood-processing waste product start with improvements to their technology IS THAT EXPERTS – to create Calci-boom, a supplement to minimise waste, improve efficiencies that can be made into a lunchbox product, and justify that initial business investment,” PREDICT THAT such as a jelly or drink. After success in the says Professor Zhang. “Once they taste the CSIRO’s ON Accelerate program, Calci- sweets of what one of our technologies can AUSTRALIA’S boom is now under commercial development. offer, then they can move onto the next!” MEET THE RESEARCHER STRIVING TO TAKE OUR HIDDEN And that’s just the tip of the marine The CMDB is supported by industry, State PRISTINE biotechnology iceberg. MARINE POTENTIAL GLOBAL. Government, Australian Research Council (ARC) and Cooperative Research Centres Driven by the global market demand for clean, ENVIRONMENT (CRC) funding, and has already seen the green and effective marine bioproducts, commercialisation of some key projects. Flinders is now leading a bid to form the first AND STRICT When it comes to Australia’s natural riches, we nutrition, pharmaceuticals and medical materials. Many more are in the pipeline. industry-led, national R&D platform for this tend to think of landbound resources, such as coal “Australia has unique marine biological diversity,” he says. emerging industry sector, called the Marine and iron. But for Professor Wei Zhang, there’s gold One of these, called Microwave Intensified REGULATORY “Nearly 70% of our marine biota is unique to our region, Bioproducts and Biotechnology Cooperative submerged just beyond our shorelines – the kind Technology, has transformed the production and marine biotechnology builds on this natural asset.” Research Centre (MBB-CRC). that could spur a burgeoning new industry. of seaweed fertiliser by Australian Kelp PRACTICES PUT The international market is already hungry for marine Products (AKP), a South Australian seaweed The MBB-CRC already has 37 industry and Founder and Director of the Flinders University Centre bioproducts, ranging from soil fertilisers and animal feeds products company. A process that once took eight university partners on board. Professor for Marine Bioproducts Development (CMBD), Professor IT IN A PRIME to nutritional supplements and preventative medicines. up to three months now takes six to nine Zhang says a CRC is essential to realising Zhang is focused on what lies in Australia’s Exclusive But in 2014, when the global industry was valued at hours, dramatically increasing productivity Australia’s immense marine wealth and Economic Zone – an area spanning some 10 million POSITION TO US$176 billion, Australia represented just US$200 while reducing use of water and chemicals. boosting its competitiveness internationally. square kilometres of marine territory. million of that. This means the factory space required is just “The CRC will be a platform to link partners Since its launch in 2007, the CMBD has been BECOME A MAJOR The good news is that experts predict that Australia’s 1% of what it was before the technology was across the value and supply chain, give investigating sustainable processing and pristine environment and strict regulatory practices put introduced, says Professor Zhang. Australia international influence and commercialisation methods for South Australian connections, and support the growth of GLOBAL PLAYER it in a prime position to become a major global player That research came through the Advanced microalgae, sea sponges, fish, rock lobsters, sea our marine biotechnology and bioproducts in the years to come. Macroalgae Biotechnology Joint Laboratory, cucumbers and seaweed. The idea is to transform these industry to contribute to what we’re dreaming IN THE YEARS established at Flinders in 2013 as a marine bioresources into high-value products for human of: an Australian blue economy worth $100 partnership between the CMBD and China’s billion by 2025.” Gather Great Ocean Group – one of the TO COME. world’s largest seaweed processors. Bring on the new Australian gold rush. Professor Wei Zhang BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 37 NATALIE FILATOFF Over the past 20 years, AusStage – the Australian Live Performance Database – has turned countless shoeboxes of “THERE ARE PERFORMANCES TAKING theatre ephemera and memories of live performance into a national record of PLACE IN THIS COUNTRY THAT WILL PERFORMANCES cultural vitality. This unique resource, holding details of more BE FORGOTTEN FOREVER, BECAUSE than 370,000 live events, directors, artists and venues, documents a part of Australia’s THERE’S NOTHING LEFT BEHIND EXCEPT identity that would otherwise be lost. THAT LIVE ON AusStage will soon welcome visitors to FOR MAYBE SOMEBODY’S MEMORY.” explore virtual re-enactments of historical theatre venues. Fewster has spent the last 15 years which enables users to curate exhibitions Jenny Fewster from Flinders College of raising millions of dollars in funding to and materials that can be existing database Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences works keep AusStage growing. records, but they also can draw in resources from other sites,” says Fewster. to expand the capacity and reach of AusStage “Our current known partnerships are with as a collector and connector of data. She has 14 academics at various universities,” “We’ve always allowed the collections to AUSTRALIANS HAVE STAGED SOME OF THE been with AusStage from the beginning – she says. “Historians also use AusStage, handle their own images and objects from joining when the project began in 2000 before because it can provide social context to any their collections. People try to give me WORLD’S MOST AMBITIOUS AND INNOVATIVE being appointed project manager in 2003 – period of Australian history.” images. I don’t want them, because I think and remains passionate about the work. that belongs in the collection sector — the Key collaborators tasked with uploading LIVE PRODUCTIONS. AUSSTAGE IS COMMITTING care of the actual ephemeral object and “There are performances taking place in this countless newspaper articles and reviews, bits of realia, that belongs in the collection country that will be forgotten forever, because collections of ephemera, photographs and THEM TO THE NATIONAL MEMORY. sector.” there’s nothing left behind except for maybe programs include universities and regional somebody’s memory,” she says. “So recording museums, the National Library of Australia The idea has recently been adopted by what happens in the field of performance and members of the vast Australian online Norway’s IbsenStage, and UKStage is now is really important otherwise it can simply library-database aggregator, Trove. seeking funding to develop on the same be lost.” platform, with the goal of one day becoming “Obviously with reviews copyright is still a interoperable with AusStage and allowing AusStage covers everything from plays, major issue, but if they’re available in Trove, researchers to trace the cultural lines of musicals, burlesque, dance and corroboree, copyright is cleared, so we leave a link back transmission between the theatre industries to circus performances and performance to the article in Trove,” says Fewster. poetry – to name just a few. For those of both nations. “And in some cases where people think it’s really involved in the performing arts, it can form “Australian performance creativity is so much important to have it embedded, we’ll embed a comprehensive record of their endeavours, broader than any of us will experience or can it in the database as well. It’s a multipronged enabling their work to be searched, while also imagine – and it must become part of the approach. We’re not really prescriptive about illuminating the ideas and influences that have historical record”, she says. everything having to be done in a certain way. travelled with them across the stage. Find AusStage at ausstage.edu.au As part of its ongoing expansion, AusStage It is a uniquely flexible tool to preserve provides funds to such organisations to the depth of artists’ and directors’ back enable the digitisation of catalogues, such as that of stage designer their own collections. It Brian Thomson. He is perhaps best known then links to or harvests for his stage designs for The Rocky Horror JENNY FEWSTER these records to build Picture Show and The Adventures of an ever richer and Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. Hundreds more comprehensive of records now hosted by AusStage show account of Australian the global extent of his artistic influence, performance history. spanning Sweden, Perth and the Bahamas, to Sydney’s Belvoir Street Theatre. AusStage has also improved its technology. As a record of a lucrative creative industry, The move some years AusStage also informs investment in arts ago to an open-source organisations all over the country. And that’s (free and easily more significant than you might think – the accessible) data- Australian performing arts sector produced management platform $1.4 billion in ticket sales in 2015 alone, ensured that AusStage’s making it a greater revenue generator than architecture could sporting events. be readily replicated. With more than two decades of experience “We’ve developed BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE working on performing arts databases, an exhibition zone, PAGE 39 JOHN PICKRELL THE HOME THAT LOOKS OUT FOR YOU

FLINDERS RESEARCHERS ARE WORKING TO IMPROVE THE LATER Professor Anthony Maeder and Professor Trish Williams YEARS OF OUR LIVES BY CREATING HIGH-TECH SMART HOMES TO KEEP US HEALTHIER AND HAPPIER FOR LONGER.

By 2050, people aged over 80 will make up okay. “If you’re an older person living alone, there’s a “There are various sensors and separate bits of The pair are working to create an intelligent diseases and increasing healthy lifespans. more than 9% of the population in developed tendency sometimes to skip meals or be inactive. The software and systems that can do all the parts overall surveillance system that can intervene “People who live more active, more satisfying, nations, compared with less than 4% now. health-smart home would take note and suggest you of this, but what’s missing is actually putting it to prevent problems before they occur. happy, fulfilling lives are more economically The obvious question is how our societies take action.” all together,” says Professor Williams. “It’s just Processing this data would be automated in engaged as well,” Professor Maeder explains. our ability to integrate them that’s been the “It’s better to keep the highest quality of life will look after them all. As well as embedded cameras and movement real-time, looking for any warning signs to flag problem.” with a human operator or carer. for as long as possible and hope for a relatively The obvious answer is to have their homes pick up detectors, the kinds of sensors required might include rapid but gentle decline at the end.” some of the slack say Professors Trish Williams and wearable heart and blood-sugar monitors. There could Anthony Maeder, who hope to have a prototype ‘smart even be data coming from the stove, fridge, shower or Professors Maeder and Williams are also home’ up and running within five years. sink. “BUT HOW CAN YOU VISUALISE THE DATA involved with the ARC Research Hub for Digital Enhanced Living, working with colleagues at Smart homes might also have conversational avatars The pair moved from different parts of Australia Deakin University in Victoria and more than a and chatbots that act in place of humans for simple IN A WAY THAT TECHNICIANS OR HEALTH to Adelaide in 2016 to set up and co-lead the dozen companies, each of which is involved tasks, or even just interact to make you feel less lonely. Flinders Digital Health Research Centre, an exciting with individual pieces of the smart home puzzle. They might also have smart walls – video screens that multidisciplinary initiative to create Australia’s first PEOPLE CAN LOOK AT IT AND SAY, ‘WHAT The pair are also collaborating with a developer seamlessly connect you with distant relatives or social healthcare smart home. The teams they lead are to produce a prototype smart home at Flinders’ networks. creating what they describe as “intelligent assistive DOES THIS MEAN?’ AND DECIDE WHAT Tonsley campus, and say a basic system could environments”, embedded in the fabric of our houses Devices such as Google Home and Amazon Alexa be up and running within five years. and apartments. already recognise voices and obey basic commands. TO DO TO HELP?” “Western society is ageing fast. We can’t just “The question is, how do we make it work in a “The concept is that your home pays attention to your wait for it to happen; we need to be ready,” healthcare setting, as opposed to online shopping, health and wellbeing, measuring or observing aspects While Professor Williams’ expertise lies in “But how can you visualise the data in a way says Professor Maeder. “If you can maintain or showing you a movie? Those sorts of requests are of your daily life relevant to health,” Professor Maeder software, cybersecurity, health informatics and that technicians or health people can look at it people in their homes, living happily in familiar much more specific,” says Professor Maeder. explains. This might be useful if you’re at risk of falling, developing IT solutions, Professor Maeder’s and say, ‘What does this mean?’ and decide surroundings without distress, without duress, or a diabetic whose blood sugar level fluctuates – the While devices already exist to monitor seniors’ health – experience lies in engineering as it relates what to do to help?” asks Professor Williams, it’s a much better life.” house can keep an eye on you, reporting unusual such as wearable sensors that detect a fall – they are to nursing and healthcare. “We complement whose team is now trying to solve that puzzle. behaviours or flagging an alert. each other well because Trish has a really nearly all standalone technologies that can’t integrate While smart homes sound expensive, there into a larger intelligent system. This is what Professors strong systems theme, and I have a very strong In essence, he says, a smart home observes what are potentially huge savings to be made by Maeder and Williams’ teams are focusing on. technical bits-and-pieces focus,” he says. you’re doing throughout the day to make sure you’re minimising hospitalisations, managing chronic BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 41 JANE NICHOLLS

RUNNING PROFESSOR CRAIG SIMMONS ON EMPTY

GUIDELINES CREATED BY FLINDERS HYDROGEOLOGISTS ARE LEADING THE WORLD IN GROUNDWATER MODELLING THAT COULD HELP PREVENT CITIES LIKE CAIRO OR CAPE TOWN FROM ONE DAY RUNNING COMPLETELY DRY.

Humans have been interested in water sources since groundwater pumped to the surface. Of course, when how cautious you want to be about, for In Australia, the guidelines underpin Professor Simmons has established himself they first crossed the African savannah, but a perfect tapping into aquifers, or engaging in activities near them, instance, using groundwater to irrigate a groundwater models that are commonly used as one of the world’s most prominent storm of population growth and climate change is there’s always the possibility of exhausting or poisoning farm when doing that may result in a nearby in Environmental Impact Statements, done hydrogeologists. In the two decades he’s spent focusing the minds of the world’s best and brightest them. wetland drying out.” whenever a business or government wants to at Flinders, he’s played a seminal role in ensuring on the field of hydrogeology like never before. undertake activities that draw water from, or its place as the epicentre of hydrogeological That’s where the Australian Groundwater Modelling Since their release in 2012, the AGWMG could potentially affect an aquifer. research excellence in Australia. “In 2018, Cape Town almost reached ‘Day Zero’ – that is, Guidelines (AGWMG) come in. have been the go-to guidelines for Australian its taps running dry – and may yet experience it in 2019,” businesses and regulators. They have The real-world impacts of the guidelines are Flinders has long been the “key groundwater It’s no simple task, figuring out how much water is stored says Professor Craig Simmons, who worries that Australia also contributed to – and often led – the profound. Groundwater accounts for around research and training higher education institution in these subterranean reservoirs, or the rate that water is is also sleepwalking into a future water crisis of its own global debate on many hydrogeological one-third of the water used in Australia, in Australia”, he says, cautiously acknowledging flowing in and out, not to mention the impact of activities making. And there are plenty of other global cities, including issues, helping to inform the modelling of facilitating the $34 billion generated by that it outperforms the likes of MIT, Princeton, such as farming, mining and fracking. Bangalore, Beijing, Cairo, Jakarta, London, Mexico City, and groundwater in nations such as Egypt, Italy, industries such as agriculture and mining. Yale and the University of Oxford. Miami, that are also facing the possibility of similar scenarios. Professor Simmons says previous methods of modelling Iran, Japan, Kuwait, Mongolia, Russia, Spain, More sophisticated modelling and better “Flinders does rank above many top-tier groundwater in Australia were the best that could be South Africa, Tanzania and Turkey. stewardship of groundwater resources means In the coming decades, Australia’s population is projected universities in this field in the global rankings,” achieved given the available science. However, by 2010, it major export industries can continue to enjoy to increase by about 60%, reaching 36 million by 2050. he says. was clear that the existing guidelines “needed an overhaul” – sustainable growth. This, “at a time when large swathes of Australia will be and he and his NCGRT colleagues took up the challenge. becoming drier,” Professor Simmons explains. They drew on the work that they and the groundwater “People don’t believe that any Australian city will have community were already doing, he says, and partnered with a Day Zero,” he says. “I’m not so sure. Granted, Australia Sinclair Knight Merz (now part of the Jacobs Engineering “AUSTRALIA CURRENTLY HAS PLENTY currently has plenty of groundwater, but water in the ground Group) – an international company specialising in strategic is like money in the bank – if you have more going out than consulting, engineering and project delivery. OF GROUNDWATER, BUT WATER IN THE coming in, you’ll eventually end up in trouble.” To support their groundwater modelling, NCGRT team As the Matthew Flinders Distinguished Professor of member Professor John Doherty developed ‘parameter GROUND IS LIKE MONEY IN THE BANK Hydrogeology at Flinders University and Director of the estimation software’ (or PEST), which allowed for more Flinders-headquartered National Centre for Groundwater effective, efficient and powerful modelling of groundwater – IF YOU HAVE MORE GOING OUT THAN Research and Training (NCGRT), Professor Simmons is systems. no alarmist. He’s devoted his career to trying to ensure that the parched dystopias that feature in sci-fi films “Acknowledging uncertainty is crucial – no modelling COMING IN, YOU’LL EVENTUALLY END never actually eventuate. guidelines will ever allow you to estimate volumes or flows to three-decimal-place accuracy,” says Professor Simmons. UP IN TROUBLE.” He says if dams run dry, water can be sourced elsewhere. “But better modelling allows for better-informed decisions. Seawater can be desalinated, wastewater recycled, and You can establish more accurate risk profiles, then decide

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 43 Not everyone would launch an investigation into mental health by looking at the human gut, but that’s “THE COMPLEX CAUSES OF MENTAL where Professor Nick Spencer believes we will find answers to many questions HEALTH PROBLEMS AND THE NEED that, until now, have been elusive. Professor Spencer works at Flinders University’s TO RESPOND TO SUCH COMPLEXITY College of Medicine and Public Health. He completed his PhD on the gut 21 years ago REQUIRES THAT WE TAKE A and admits that the study is not for everyone. “The gut was not a very popular organ for a MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACH variety of reasons. It was thought to be just an organ to digest food and absorb nutrients and IF WE ARE TO MAKE ANY IMPACT.” pass those nutrients on into the bloodstream so that we can survive,” he says. It was precisely these unexpected complex links The Órama Institute, a Greek word meaning Even today, it is little understood. So when which Professor Mike Kyrios – Vice President “vision”, contributes a unique blend of disciplines the links between the brain, behaviour and and Executive Dean of Flinders’ College of examining positive wellbeing and mental health the microbes that live in our intestines – our Education, Psychology and Social Work – had disorders. had in mind when he proposed a new research microbiome – began to be noticed, Professor “We will also work with the full spectrum centre on mental health. Spencer took a keen interest. of external partners, locally, nationally and Faecal transplants between patients are The Órama Institute is designed to be a multi- internationally, including state and federal showing promising effects on the wellbeing of disciplinary research institute for mental health, governments, health and mental health human patients and have been shown to cause wellbeing and neuroscience. services, professional groups, communities and behavioural changes in animal models. But “The complex causes of mental health problems community organisations,” says Professor Kyrios. investigating how this all might work presented and the need to respond to such complexity “We aim to be a major ‘go to’ mental health and another problem – no one knew very much requires that we take a multidisciplinary wellbeing institute when government is seeking about the sensory nerves in the gut. approach if we are to make any impact,” says advice on mental health and wellbeing matters.” Professor Kyrios. BILL CONDIE “Until five years ago, no one had ever identified where one of the major populations of sensory “Biological, social, developmental and individual nerve endings is located in any internal organ factors are all involved in the cause of mental of any species,” says Professor Spencer. health problems, while solutions demand So before he could even start to work out how coordination of clinical, policy and technological the microbiome affected the mind, he needed to advances from multiple professions, disciplines, GUT come up with a technique to observe the nerve public organisations and stakeholders.” endings. He did that by injecting a tracer into a collection of sensory neutrons near the spinal PROFESSOR NICK SPENCER cords of mice. That has allowed scientists for the first time to visualise where the key sensory FEELINGS nerve endings are located and how they are involved in the gut-brain communication. This technique took a long time to develop. “It’s really exciting. Because understanding how the contents within the gut wall communicate with the sensory nerves can uncover major clues into gut-brain health A NEW RESEARCH CENTRE INTO MENTAL HEALTH and wellbeing,” says Professor Spencer. ENCOMPASSES SOME SURPRISING APPROACHES. He is now working on step two of the research to discover precisely how the sensory nerves in the gut are activated.

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE PAGE 45 BILL CONDIE

HOW A NEW ACADEMIC CENTRE IS BRINGING TOGETHER ALL SOCIAL WORK’S STAKEHOLDERS.

Professor Sarah Wendt

Growing up on a farm, Professor Sarah “So, domestic violence erodes aspects of SWIRLS is designed to engage The Nyland report recommended more SWIRLS has quickly developed a reputation “But, it’s going to be slow in how we try and Wendt came to understand a thing or two women’s lives and brings trauma into their lives. practitioners and organisations across research to increase the evidence space among researchers for an academic centre that break down those barriers of privacy, or secrecy. about isolation. And when she became How they understand that trauma, and how it multiple fields, although its main current about how we can better improve systems, is no ivory tower, but committed to including the Shame and embarrassment are the biggest a social worker, those insights began relates to domestic violence, is often complex. focus is in the area of domestic violence, practices and child protection – an obvious lived experiences of individuals, families, groups contributing factors, firstly, why women don't to inform her work, especially around How do they seek help…these things are unique child protection, homelessness and youth. It fit with the SWIRLS’ vision. and communities. seek help for domestic and family violence.” domestic violence. and make it more difficult to understand and is designed as a space where researchers SWIRLS also works with Women Safety “We interview children or women who have And Professor Wendt believes that with respond to domestic violence.” and practitioners, policy makers or other key “I was extremely interested in how rural and Services South Australia tackling domestic experienced violence. We interview men who awareness raising will come a new focus on stakeholders can come together, to confront remote women’s experiences are shaped by But always there is one essential element – and family violence, the Department of use violence. We try and work with families to changing men’s behaviour. problems together and co-design ways to the context in which they live, and how they coercive control – at its centre. Child Protection, and KWY: an aboriginal have a say about their experiences and their tackle them. “The focus has always mainly been on, of course understand and respond to domestic violence,” specialist, family violence service. responses. SWIRLS is committed to being “When you look across diverse groups of understandably, how you help women and says Professor Wendt of Flinders University’s “So, when I say practice, I mean working inclusive of those that are doing the practice, women, you will see that pattern of behaviour, Those three agencies are looking particularly children. I think now we are at a point in time, College of Education, Psychology and with people on the ground,” says Professor and those that are receiving the practice.” no matter if you’re rich, poor, religious or not, at how collaborations can deliver better particularly in Australia, where you’ll now start Social Work. Wendt. “But the ultimate outcome is not living in a rural community, or urban.” responses to families with complex needs. Professor Wendt acknowledges that domestic to see much more conversations around, ‘Well, just naming problems, but doing something Before her PhD, she had worked the crisis violence, by its nature, is often perceived as what are we doing about the perpetrator?’ It was Professor Wendt’s roots in the practical about them.” “Our research is straddling two things,” telephone lines, enabling women to flee violent being private and kept secret. “That’s why business of social work which drove her vision says Professor Wendt. “Collaboration and “Instead of expecting women and children to situations at the point of crisis, and working with Professor Wendt sees it as a two-way street. we have to have awareness raising,” she says, for the groundbreaking new centre she and her changing practice, but also researching deal with this all on their own, questions are at women in the women shelters. “and I think we, in Australia, for the first time team have established at the University. “You can have big models that have been that practice as we go along so that we can last being asked about how we enable behaviour have started to really increase the awareness And while her 2009 thesis, Domestic Violence in tested and trialled, from which we can learn trial and test and learn what we’re doing and attitudinal change.” The Social Work Innovation Research Living of domestic and family violence, and that's Rural Australia, explored many women’s country a lot from and apply into practice. before we impose massive solutions onto a Space, or SWIRLS, began with Professor a good thing. Historically, this has been attempted through experiences, her experience told her that it’s system that’s already complex.” Wendt’s vision of engaging more clearly and “But, I also think there’s a lot of work men’s behaviour change programs, typically not just the tyranny of distance that can cause directly with relevant key stakeholders in happening in practice that is invisible, and a 12-week programme. But it is difficult to isolation. the social work ‘industry’. It launched in that we don’t know about.” determine if these have been effective. “It can be physical barriers to seek help, but March 2019. “So, we’re starting to now look at what it SWIRLS has already forged close links with “SHAME AND EMBARRASSMENT ARE it can also be social isolation,” says Professor means to engage men,” says Professor Wendt. “I believe that practice really influences research the South Australian government through Wendt. “Men’s use of violence in intimate “We want long-term, sustainable change and in social work, and research can influence agencies for child protection and Housing THE BIGGEST CONTRIBUTING FACTORS, relationships isolates women from family, I think we’ve expected too much of a 12-week practice in social work. SA. It also has a partnership with the Early friends, community, employment and leisure.” program. We have to start now looking at other Intervention Research Directorate, the EIRD, “And so those two things have to have a FIRSTLY, WHY WOMEN DON'T SEEK HELP ways in which we’re going to work with men which was established in response to the relationship, and when that works well, we can to stop this issue”. educate the future workforce of social workers 2016 Nyland Royal Commission into the FOR DOMESTIC AND FAMILY VIOLENCE.” BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE in much more up-to-date ways.” Child Protection System. PAGE 47 PROFESSOR ALISON KITSON

An ageing population, chronic diseases, A simple trip to the optometrist or GP can health issues resulting from bad lifestyle be a terrifying ordeal for someone with autistic choices and social isolation – we face spectrum disorder, as they enter a hostile a raft of wicked problems that medical clinical environment, which soon brings on interventions alone cannot fix. sensory overload. That made Professor Alison Kitson realise that “Paul is developing and testing the benefits we needed a different approach, which led to of sensory-friendly waiting rooms so that kids the Caring Futures Institute – the world’s first have the right sort of stimulation, and so are in organisation dedicated to the research of care. a better frame of mind for whatever examination they are having.” “In a perfect world, both cure and care would be two parts of the solution. We’re looking at One of the most challenging forms of care is the care side of the equation,” says Professor working with people with dementia and work Kitson, Vice-President and Executive Dean that often falls to carers whose first language of the University’s College of Nursing and isn’t English. Health Sciences. “So you have multiple challenges – people The Institute brings together an eclectic range from different cultures who speak different “WE’VE GOT of disciplines and interests to investigate ways to languages, who possibly have not had the improve people’s lives and enrich the community educational opportunities they would have BILL CONDIE through care. wanted, and they are expected to care for SOME GREAT some of the most vulnerable in our community,” “We’ve got some great stars who are working says Professor Kitson. STARS WHO in areas of high impact, which make a real difference to people’s lives,” says Professor “Another of our researchers, Professor Lily Kitson. Xiao, is developing training packages for carers ARE WORKING from different cultures in their own language The Institute partners with government, health to make sure that they both understand what’s systems and industry, and works in support of IN AREAS OF happening so that they feel much more involved both professional carers and those who care and confident in their work.” for loved ones at home. HIGH IMPACT, Professor Kitson admits that many of the “We’re looking at a range of really practical solutions sound like common sense. WHICH MAKE things. For example, our researchers are developing apps that busy mums and dads can “But remember, people now believe it is common use to identify food services that provide healthy sense that smoking causes lung cancer. But it A REAL nutrition for their kids,” says Professor Kitson. took more than 30 years from when the research was first produced for people to believe that “We have a wonderful piece of work by our DIFFERENCE connection. Our new Caring Futures Institute will A WORLD-FIRST INITIATIVE FOR BETTER optometry team led by Dr Paul Constable, help with the translation of this sort of knowledge looking at the challenges of young people into common sense solutions that make a HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE SYSTEMS TO PEOPLE’S living with autism.” difference to peoples’ lives.”

BRAVE MINDS | EDITION ONE LIVES.” PAGE 49

BEC CREW This fossil represents the origin of sex as we SHARKS OF ANTARCTICA know it – a 400-million-year-old fish carrying a perfectly preserved embryo. Found in 2015 by Professor Long on Gogo 3 Station in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, it made the Guinness World Records 5 FOSSIL 2010 as the ‘Oldest Live Birth’. “It was remarkable, not only because it was the oldest embryo and represented the origin of complex sexual reproduction, but it also had DISCOVERIES a mineralised umbilical cord still attached to the embryo,” says Professor Long. The species was named Materpiscis The fossilised tooth of a 390-million-year-old Antarctic shark. Credit: John Long. attenboroughi after Sir David Attenborough, who later remarked, “Now my name will always Fossilised teeth and jaw bones pulled from “Trevor and Aaron have been pioneering THAT STUNNED be associated with the origins of sex.” rocks in Antarctica established it as the origin new methods of fossil collection to make point of shark diversity on Earth. these discoveries,” says Professor Long. “These are very remote salt lakes and you “These fossils represent a massive increase in can’t take a normal four-wheel drive out there, size,” says Professor Long, estimating that these so they’ve been hiring quad bikes to get to 390-million-year-old sharks would have been sites that no one else has ever been to.” THE WORLD 2 three metres long. “The only known sharks that LIONS AND TREE KANGAROOS are older than these were really, really tiny.” These giant birds weren’t like emus or cassowaries – their closest living relatives IN THE NULLARBOR Professor Long has spent 30 years braving are ducks and geese. No wonder they’ve the harsh conditions of the Transantarctic been nicknamed the ‘demon ducks’. Mountains to find fossils like these, with more expeditions planned to continue his search for prehistoric fish.

FINDING FOSSILS, SAYS INTERNATIONALLY RENOWNED PALAEONTOLOGIST “We’ve crossed crevasse fields, been hit by PROFESSOR JOHN LONG, IS AN ART FORM. AND JUST LIKE PROSPECTING avalanches – we’ve had all sorts of life and death adventures out there.” 5 FOOTPRINTS OF AUSTRALIA’S LARGEST AT THE EDGE OF A LAKE, THE REAL SKILL IS KNOWING HOW TO PUT LAND MAMMAL YOURSELF IN THE PRIME POSITION TO STRIKE GOLD.

As Australia’s leading university for 4 GREAT, THUNDERING DUCKS palaeontology, Flinders University has an 1 incredible track record of discoveries that have THE ‘MOTHER FISH’ John Long with the first ever complete marsupial made their mark on the international stage. lion skeleton. Credit: Clay Bryce/Western Australian Museum. Caption: Footprints of the car-sized Diprotodon. “We know what we’re doing, we know how to find Credit: Amy Toensing. It might be a barren landscape now, but

fossils,” says John Long, Strategic Professor in hundreds of thousands of years ago the Prehistoric animal tracks are extremely rare Nullarbor Plain in southern Australia would have Palaeontology at Flinders University and member in Australia, but Dr Camens managed to been a very different place. In fact, it was once find a site in western Victoria where an array home to a bunch of tree-dwelling marsupials. of the Flinders Palaeontology Group. of extinct animal footprints has been In the early 2000s, a team led by Professor An almost complete skeleton of Genyornis, the preserved in a long-evaporated lake bed. “You can spend five or six weeks out in the last surviving dromornithid. Credit: Aaron Camens. Gavin Prideaux discovered skeletal remains “It’s a unique slice of prehistoric time field, but eventually you hit paydirt and you find of an extinct species of tree kangaroo – now preserved,” says Professor Long. known as Bohra – that had fallen into a In 2014, the remains of the giant flightless The site also happens to include tracks left by something spectacular.” cave. Alongside it were fossils from animals bird Genyornis were found at Lake Callabona no one had ever seen before, as well as the in South Australia by Drs Trevor Worthy and the car-sized, wombat-like Diprotodon, Here are five of the most iconic finds first complete skeleton of a marsupial lion. Aaron Camens. It belonged to a group called Australia’s largest ever marsupial, which the dromornithids, which, standing 3 metres tall weighed up to 2.8 tonnes. Close-up of an embryo inside a fossilised fish, with the umbilical “The whole discovery was huge,” says by Flinders palaeontologists. and weighing 650 kg, were some of the largest cord still visible. Credit: John Long. Professor Long. “It caused a sensation birds ever to have lived on Earth. in the media.”

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