Leaders in Science

Professor Michael Archer AM
Research and postgraduate supervision of research projects by Mike Archer has been carried out in almost all fields of vertebrate palaeontology, stratigraphy, palaeoecology and biocorrelation. Mike Archer has published more than 300 publications. Since 1976, he has named and studied (sometimes with coauthors) more than 120 new species, genera, families and orders of both living and extinct mammals discovered as a consequence of his research. By 1995, Mike Archer's research group had more than trebled the number of named Tertiary mammals previously known from Australia...

Associate Professor Rob Brooks
Director, Evolution & Ecology Research Centre
Research conducted by Rob Brooks involves the application of quantitative genetics, functional genomics and behavioural ecology to test evolutionary theory, particularly in the context of sexual reproduction. The majority of his published work has addressed the nature and evolution of mate choice behaviour, and the coevolution between mate choice and sexual advertisement. In addition to helping understand the evolution of mating behaviour, it has provided insights into sex chromosome evolution, the biology of ageing and longevity, the risks of extinction, the genetic costs of inbreeding, the biological basis of individual diversity, and the measurement of natural selection...

Dr David Cohen
Head of School, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences
David Cohen has 15 years experience in pure and applied exploration geochemistry research based in Australia, Asia and North America.  He is President-elect of the (International) Association of Applied Geochemists.  Current research projects include sampling and analytical methods for exploration and environmental geochemistry, environmental geochemical baseline surveys and multivariate data mining.  He is a senior lecturer and researcher at UNSW in environmental and exploration geochemistry, economic geology, geological data processing and statistics methods, and supervises a number of postgraduate research students in exploration geochemistry. He has been involved in major environmental consultancies including the contaminant assessment of the Olympic Village Site (Newington), the Orica site at Botany, Bicentennial Ponds in Rockdale and Regional Geochemical Surveys of the NE region of NSW and Cyprus.  He has been a technical consultant to a number of industrial companies and government departments...

Dr Emma Johnston
Senior Lecturer , School of Biological Earth and Environmental Sciences
Dr Emma Johnston's research focuses on pollution as a disturbance to the ecology of marine invertebrate assemblages. This research is approached from both an ecological and ecotoxicological perspective using field experimentation wherever possible. Emma teaches MSCI2001 Introductory Marine Science, MSCI2051 Coral Reef: Environment and Ecology, BIOS3091 Marine and Aquatic Ecology, BIOS2031 Biology of Invertebrates and GENS0501 The Marine Environment...

Dr Scott Mooney
Associate Dean (Undergraduate Programs), Faculty of Science
Scott is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences and Associate Dean (Undergraduate Programs) in the Faculty of Science at UNSW. Educated with undergraduate (BSc(Hons), 1988 in Applied Physical Geography) and postgraduate (PhD, 1996 in Palaeoecology, human impact and palaeoclimatology) degrees from UNSW, Scott is responsible for all academic matters relating to student recruitment, admissions and progression. Scott contributes to the teaching of GEOS1701 Environmental Systems and Processes, GEOS2711 Australian Climate and Vegetation and GEOS3761 Environmental Change. His research has a number of foci summarized by the question 'how can a better understanding of the past be applied to contemporary and future natural resource management?' In the recent past he has been investigating the history of bushfires to address the role of humans and climate...

Associate Professor Peter White
Senior Lecturer in Microbiology and Molecular Biology
Peter White lectures in microbiology and molecular biology subjects and convenes the Viruses and Disease 3rd year course. Research interests include: replication of hepatitis C virus and norovirus; identifying epidemic and recombinant strains of norovirus; evolutionary dynamics of HCV during acute infection; virological analysis of major Australian clinical trials to cure HCV; enteric viruses in environmental, water and faecal samples (Commercial Applications and QRA work); mechanisms and dissemination of antibiotic resistance, with interest in integrons...

Scientia Professor Veena Sahajwalla
Associate Dean (Strategic Industry Relations), Faculty of Science
Director, Centre for Sustainable Materials Research and Technology
(SMaRT@UNSW)
Scientia Professor Veena Sahajwalla leads the research on Sustainable Materials Processing at University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney, Australia. She is the Director of Centre of Sustainable Materials Research & Technology (SMaRT@UNSW) with its central research focus on sustainable materials and processes with strong emphasis on environmental and community benefits...

Professor Matt England
Co-Director, Climate Change Research Centre
Matthew explores global-scale ocean circulation and the influence it has on regional climate, large-scale physical oceanography, ocean modelling, and climate processes, with a particular focus on the Southern Hemisphere. Using ocean and coupled climate models in combination with observations, Matthew England studies what controls ocean currents and how these currents affect climate and climate variability on time-scales of seasons to centuries. Applications include (1) the circulation and variability of the Southern Ocean and its role in regional climate patterns, (2) global-scale water-mass formation: mechanisms, variability and stability, (3) the oceans thermohaline circulation, stability, and feedback to the atmosphere, (4) the Southern Annular Mode and Australian rainfall variability, and (5) past ocean circulation states and paleoclimate modelling...

Professor Andy Pitman
Co-Director, Climate Change Research Centre
Andy is a climate modeller with a major focus on land surface processes. Recently, he has been working on coupled carbon modules for climate models including dynamic vegetation how vegetation responds to increasing carbon dioxide and how uncertain our projections of the future might be given instability in terrestrial carbon storage. He has also explored the global and regional impacts of land cover change. He has interests in climate extremes and how these are likely to change in the future. Andy co-chairs the Project for the Intercomparison of Landsurface Parameterization Schemes, he is chair of GLASS, a lead author in the IPCC, a member of National Committee for Earth System Science, convenor of the ARC Research Network for Earth System Science and co-director of the Climate Change Research Centre at UNSW...

Dr David Warton
Senior Lecturer, School of Mathematics and Statistics
David Warton is an ecological statistician and Senior Lecturer in the Department of Statistics at the University of New South Wales. His research interests primarily involve developing new methodologies for data analysis in ecological research, and increasing awareness in ecology and related disciplines of existing methodologies.He has lectured at first, second and third year level...

Dr Thomas Denson
Lecturer, School of Psychology
Tom Denson currently conducts research into the causes and consequences of anger and aggression in humans, aggressive personality, biological correlates of anger and angry rumination, intergroup aggression, and prejudice. He has teaching experience in both the United States and Australia... 

Professor Joe Forgas
Scientia Professor of Psychology
Research interests include affective influences on cognition, judgments and social behaviour, the experimental analysis of interpersonal behaviour, social perception and social decisions and interpersonal communication...

Dr Michelle Moulds
Senior Lecturer, School of Psychology
Michelle Moulds is investigating the role of rumination in depression, the impact of rumination on memory functioning, the role of intrusive memories in depressive disorders and comorbidity of post-traumatic stress disorder and depression...

Professor Michelle Simmons
Director of the Atomic Fabrication Facility, Centre for Quantum Computer Technology and School of Physics
Professor Simmons is a Federation Fellow and Director of the Atomic Fabrication Facility at the UNSW. In the 1990s, she spent 6 years as a Research Fellow working with Professor Sir Michael Pepper FRS at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, UK, in quantum electronics. In 1999, she came to Australia where she was a founding member of the Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computer Technology. Her research in nanoelectronics combines molecular beam epitaxy and scanning tunnelling microscopy to develop novel electronic devices at the atomic scale. She has published more than 240 papers in refereed journals (with over 2800 citations), published a book on Nanotechnology, three book chapters on quantum electronics, has filed three patents and has presented over 50 invited and plenary presentations at international conferences. In 2005 she was awarded the Pawsey Medal by the Australian Academy of Science and in 2006 became the one of the youngest elected Fellows of this Academy...