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Curtin Professor the only WA academic named in Engineers Australia's Top 100

Curtin University of Technology’s Dean of Engineering Professor Moses Tadé is the only Western Australian academic to be given a place in the prestigious Engineers Australia magazine’s Top 100 Most Influential Engineers in 2008.

The Top 100 engineers list focuses on present influence rather than historic achievement and is compiled each year by an eminent panel of advisors.   Engineers Australia magazine is published by Engineers Media, a subsidiary company of the Institution of Engineers Australia.

Professor Tadé has been recognised as a Top 100 engineer due to his outstanding leadership and advocacy  for Curtin‘s outreach scheme, as well as for his role  in securing a number of industry sponsored scholarships for engineering students.

“As Dean of Engineering, I am focused on attracting more high school students to consider engineering,” Professor Tadé said.

“We are working with other Australian Technology Network universities to target year 9 students in three Western Australian high schools and 12 high schools in other states.

“I am also committed to encouraging a greater number of industry-sponsored scholarships for our students, which enhances our links with businesses in WA.”

Professor Tadé and his colleagues have also secured close to $1 million in grants from the Australian Research Council this year for projects in process systems engineering.

Professor Tadé was appointed Dean of Engineering at Curtin in January this year, prior to this appointment he was Head of the Department of Chemical Engineering and Personal Chair of Process Systems Engineering from 2001 to December 2007.  Professor Tadé is recognised as being the key researcher on three Australian Research Council grants starting in 2008.  He is a Deputy Program Leader for CRC-CARE (Contaminant Assessment and Remediation of the Environment) as well as being Journal Editor-in-Chief for the Asia Pacific Journal of Chemical Engineering published by John Wiley, UK.

Professor Tadé follows Professor Lucey, the previous Dean of Engineering at Curtin who is listed as one of 2007’s Top 100 Most Influential Engineers for his role in the expansion of the Curtin Engineering Faculty and his position as an expert in the field of fluid dynamics.

According to Dr Dietrich Georg, Managing Editor of Engineers Media, their Top 100 list focuses on engineers currently in positions of influence, either as leaders of large organisations or by virtue of their engineering expertise.

“We began compiling the list in 2004 with the aim of disproving the then widely held view that engineers were good at problem-solving but rarely made it into top leadership positions,” he said.

“Australia’s top engineers work in a variety of fields in Australia and overseas, so we classify them into seven different categories – industry, consulting, academia/research, engineering expertise, associations, public service and other,” Dr Georg said.

The 2008 list of Australia’s 100 most influential engineers is the fifth Engineers Australia magazine has produced.  The list includes engineers working in Australia independent of their citizenship, as well as Australian engineers working overseas.  Names are not ranked, as the level of influence in the different areas of activity is difficult to compare.

For more information on Australia’s Top 100 Engineers go to the website http://www.engineersmedia.com.au/magazines/ea/top100_08/top_intro08.html

Contact:  Professor Moses Tade, 08 9266 7581, M.O.Tade@curtin.edu.au or Lisa Mayer, PR Coordinator, Curtin, 08 9266 1930, 0401 103 755 l.mayer@curtin.edu.au

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Curtin led team discover key to earliest life on Earth

The accepted timeframe for the beginnings of life on Earth is now being questioned by a Curtin University of Technology led team of scientists, after finding a key indicator to the earliest life forms in diamonds from Jack Hills in Western Australia.

The 4.2 billion year old diamonds found trapped inside the Jack Hills zircon crystals are the oldest-known samples of Earth’s carbon.  The Curtin led team’s discovery of very high concentrations of carbon 12, or “light carbon” within these crystals is remarkable as it is a feature usually associated with organic life.

Dr Alexander Nemchin from Curtin’s Department of Applied Geology and the project leader believes the latest research will revive debate on the early evolution of life on Earth.

“We believe this find to be the oldest terrestrial light carbon reservoir discovered so far,” Dr Nemchin said.

Evidence for ancient life stretches back in time to at least 3.5 billion years ago, in the form of single-celled organisms that did not require oxygen.  The discovery of light carbon in the Jack Hills crystals raises the question – did a simple life form exist on Earth 700 million years earlier than previously thought?

“We interpret the range of light carbon values observed in these inclusions as a unique chemical marker that opens up the possibility of biological activity during the period not long after the Earth’s formation,” Dr Nemchin said.

The Curtin team’s findings are presented in a paper published in the 3 July 2008 issue of the prestigious international scientific journal Nature.  In their paper entitled “A light carbon reservoir recorded in zircon-hosted diamond from the Jack Hills” the researchers report the composition of 22 diamond and graphite inclusions from 18 Jack Hills zircon grains.

“The discovery challenges our fundamental understanding of processes active in the early history of the Earth.  It suggests that life may well have appeared on Earth long before the period of heavy-meteorite bombardment believed by some to have initiated the emergence of life on Earth,” Dr Nemchin said. 

“Alternatively, it requires some other process to create the light carbon values, which would then question the widely held assumption that light carbon means life.”

The discovery will assist mankind in our understanding of the development of the planet and help us to better assess the conditions of the Earth up to 4,500 billion years ago.

Note to Editor:

In 1983, a Curtin project team discovered extremely old zircon crystals in a collection of rocks located between Meekathara and Carnarvon.  Twenty years later, the oldest diamonds were unexpectedly discovered in these rocks by many of the original team.

The recent paper in Nature is written by a team of people made up of Curtin University academic and Project Leader, Dr Alexander Nemchin, Martin Whitehouse from the Swedish Museum of Natural History, Martina Menneken and Dr Thorston Geisler a Masters student and her supervisor from the University of Munster’s Institute of Mineralogy, and Professors Pidgeon and Wilde from Curtin University’s Applied Geology Department, who originally identified the old zircons.

Photos available on request.

Contact:  Dr Alexander Nemchin from 1500 to 0300 hours Australian Western Standard Time on 0411 520 154, a.nemchin@curtin.edu.au 

or Lisa Mayer, PR Co-ordinator, Curtin, from 0900 to 1800 hours Australian Western Standard Time, 08 9266 1930, 0401 103 755 l.mayer@curtin.edu.au

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Curtin welcomed thousands of TEE students for conference

Almost 6,000 Year 12 students and their teachers from all over Western Australia were at Curtin University of Technology for the 2008 English/English Literature Conference recently.

Eager to hone their skills in English and English Literature for the TEE, students from over 90 private and public secondary schools attended lectures during the four day annual conference on the Bentley Campus from 23-26 June.

Some students and teachers travelled from Albany, Pinjarra and Bullsbrook to join with those from high schools such as Kent Street Senior High School, Ursula Frayne Catholic College and Penhros College.

Head of Communication and Cultural Studies, Dr Ron Blaber said the Conference was extremely popular and had been running each year since 1986. He emphasised the advantages for the students who attend the Conference.

“The Conference reinforces a deeper understanding of the secondary English and English Literature syllabus and also focuses on exam tasks and questions,” Dr Blaber said.

“Students are provided with new ways of understanding important information such as texts and genres.

“The experience also complements the excellent work of secondary school teachers, and the Conference’s success owes a great deal to the continuing support of teachers and schools .”
 
Each day of the Conference up to 1,500 students were on campus. In any one session students had a choice of up to eight lectures and over the course of the day attended five lectures.

“Up to 37 lectures on 24 topics were presented each day,” Dr Blaber said. 

“Students also had the opportunity to interact with Curtin staff and experience university life.”

“The Conference is an important annual event on the University’s calendar, and it shows the strong links between the Communication and Cultural Studies Program and secondary English and English Literature education in WA.” 

Kent Street Senior High School Year 12 student Zac Price feels more confident about gaining top marks in English after attending the Conference at Curtin.

“I really like doing English and I got a lot out of the lectures on what I need to focus on so I can do well in my TEE exams,” Zac said.

Attention Editor/COS: A photograph is available on request.

Marketing students raise money to fight poor sanitation in Africa

Curtin Business School students have joined forces with Lifewater Canada to raise money to improve sanitation in a Liberian community in Africa.

The Curtin Marketing Association (CMA) initiative will provide the Liberian community with a latrine and a health and hygiene workshop to raise awareness amongst the community of the importance of sanitary practice.

The CMA organised a three day statistical workshop in 2006 and the money raised from this was donated to Lifewater Canada. The construction of the latrine was completed recently and the workshop was held soon after construction was finalised.

Associate Professor Ian Phau who founded the CMA said that simple interventions such as the construction of latrines can make a vast difference in improving public health.

“Approximately four billion people globally suffer from chronic waterborne disease which is linked to a lack of adequate sanitation and poses a serious health risk,” Associate Professor Phau said.

“You realise how fortunate you are when you see people around the world that don’t have clean water and adequate sanitation.

“Many of the local community members have never used a latrine and have never been taught sanitary habits. To educate the community on this is a huge challenge and getting people to change their habits is more difficult than building the infrastructure.”

The CMA is a non-profit association governed by students which aims to build social, academic and industry-based relationships and skills. CMA initiate, organise and run many events every semester, providing members with experience in advertising, event planning, sponsorship and media.

Lifewater Canada is a volunteer-driven organisation that trains and equips the rural poor in Africa to drill wells and build washrooms.

Note to Editor: A photograph of A/Professor Phau is available on request or photo opportunities with A/Professor Phau and CMA students can be organised on request.

Curtin offers help with business planning

Curtin University of Technology’s Muresk Institute is offering agricultural and regional businesses free help to prepare a business plan which develops an idea or proposal.

This unique offer is linked to a major project which agribusiness students undertake in their final year of study.

Professor Graeme Robertson, Director of Muresk explained this unique offer.

“Students concluding their degrees in the agribusiness streams of marketing, viticulture, equine, horticulture and aquaculture and seafood sciences undertake a business planning unit in their second semester. The unit requires them, usually in groups of three, to prepare a business plan for a real business opportunity,” Professor Robertson said.

The resulting business plans are of a professional standard and are a sound basis for new and existing businesses to make decisions on expansion, new activities or new products.

”The plans include an assessment of the production systems, market research, advice on marketing and a financial evaluation,” Professor Robertson said.

“In the past, students have assessed the cost of establishing processing plants, the design of specialised equipment, the importing and exporting of new products as well as determining prices that customers may be willing to pay for new products.  This information can be extremely important in order to make informed decisions on new investments and has been used by many clients to launch new businesses.

“To get the most out of the unit the students need to work with real proposals and we are now seeking topics or business opportunities for 2008.  The students need a topic, and an “owner” of the idea who will be the client to the students as consultants.”

During the process the students operate as professional consultants.  All work is confidential and only discussed between the students and the client, and Professor Robertson as the mentor and supervisor of the process. Usually a confidentiality agreement is signed between the “owner”, the students and Professor Robertson.

Anyone with a business plan concept they wish to develop should contact Graeme Robertson at Muresk on 08 9266 4400, or email (G.Robertson@curtin.edu.au ).

Contact:  Lisa Mayer, PR Coordinator, Curtin, 08 9266 1930, 0401 103 755 l.mayer@curtin.edu.au

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