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Big Bang and bio-sensors win awards
By Bob Beale
December 8, 2008
Dr Kris Kilian
Scientia Professor Victor Flambaum
By Bob Beale
December 8, 2008
Dr Kris Kilian
Scientia Professor Victor Flambaum
One of the Faculty's most senior researchers in physics and one of its most outstanding doctoral students in chemistry have been recognised with major professional awards.
Scientia Professor Victor Flambaum has been awarded the 2008 Lyle Medal by the Australian Academy of Science. Dr Kris Kilian has won the 2008 Cornforth Medal for his PhD research, awarded by the Royal Australian Chemical Institute.
The Lyle Medal recognises the contribution of Sir Thomas Ranken Lyle, FRS, to Australian science and industry generally and in particular to his own fields of physics and mathematics. The purpose of the medal is to recognise outstanding achievement by a scientist in Australia for research in mathematics or physics.
Professor Flambaum is head of the Theoretical Physics Department in the UNSW School of Physics. His research interests include many challenging problems in atomic , nuclear, elementary particle, solid state physics and astrophysics. They range from high-precision atomic calculations through to the search for spatial and temporal variation of the fundamental constants in the Universe from the Big Bang to the present time.
His other awards include the Lenin Komsomol Prize (USSR) and the Centenary Medal (Australia).
Dr Kilian received the Cornforth Medal after this doctoral thesis was judged to be the best doctoral thesis in Chemical Sciences awarded by any Australian university in the previous year. The medal is designed to give recognition of outstanding achievement in chemistry and to promote chemical communication.
Dr Kilian conducted his research in the UNSW School of Chemistry under the supervision of Professor Justin Gooding. The medal commemorates the work of Nobel laureate Sir John Cornforth AC CBE FRS.
He came to Australia from Seattle specifically to work with the Gooding group. Being an American this was a significant risk for him both financially, as he had to pay his own fees, and professionally as Australia is so distant from the ivy league institutions of the USA.
"But his research was at such a high level though that his gamble paid off as he is now working in one of the leading research groups in bio-nanotechnol
Dr Kilian has also been awarded a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award from the National Institute of Health in the USA for a post-doctoral fellowship for three years.
His thesis was titled "Chemical and Biological Modification of Porous Silicon Photonic Crystals". It concerned making sensors for the detection of protease activity - enzymes that break down proteins. Elevated levels of protease enzymes are indicators of infection and the immune response.
Dr Kilian solved a long-standing problem of stabilising silicon optical devices so they could be used in the body or in water, says Professor Gooding.
"He then showed they could be used to detect the release of protease enzymes from living cells, which takes us a long way towards cell chips for the development of new drugs and cell based sensors that can detect pathogens or bio-warfare agents."
Media contact:
Bob Beale 0411 705 435, bbeale@unsw.edu
