RR_2009

Research Review 2009

…institutes, innovation,

infrastructure…

The University of Melbourne Research Review, August 2009

Published by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) through the Marketing and Communications Office

Level 3, 780 Elizabeth StreetThe University of MelbourneVictoria 3010

ISSN 1441–3302

Enquries for reprinting information contained in this publication should be made through the Editor, Research Review.

Marketing and Communications Office Level 3, 780 Elizabeth StreetThe University of MelbourneVictoria 3010

t +61 3 8344 5267f +61 3 9349 4135

A complete listing of University of Melbourne research projects is available at: www.research.unimelb.edu.au/rpag/reports/research

Editor: Silvia Dropulich

Cover Image: Nobel Laureate Professor Peter Doherty Photo: Fred Kroh

Writers: Silvia Dropulich, Nerissa Hannink, David Scott, Rebecca Scott, Emma O’Neill, Katherine Smith, Helen Varnavas

Views expressed by contributors to Research Review are not necessarily endorsed or approved by the University. Neither the University nor the Editor of Research Review accepts any responsibility for the content or accuracy contained in this publication.

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Melbourne Newsroom

Newsroom.melbourne.edu – The University of Melbourne has launched a new-look dedicated news website that provides expert comment, news and views from across the University. The Melbourne Newsroom (TMN) includes featured video clips of Melbourne academics giving expert comment on the latest news, as well as information on breaking research and organisational announcements.

You can follow the Newsroom on Twitter, and keep up to date with public lectures, seminars, exhibitions and performances on campus through the What’s On section of the site.

The website is also home to the University’s suite of news tools, including Up Close podcasts, Visions vodcasts, Voice newspaper, selected blogs from our academics, and Who’s Who at the University of Melbourne, a searchable database of academics available to provide expert comment on issues in the news. To find out the latest news from the University of Melbourne go to www.newsroom.melbourne.edu

RESEARCH REVIEW 2009

Contents 2 Introduction and Overview (text to come)

Features

4 Melbourne Lands Key Role in $1bn Cancer Centre

6 The Future of Sight

8 The Nano Revolution

10 The Science of Scepticism: Peter Doherty Profile

12 SPECIAL REPORT: The Parkville Research Precinct

16 Emerging Institutes

20 Bio21 Institute Builds Research Critical Mass

22 Mental Disorders a Major Problem for the Young

24 Greening our Rooftops

26 It’s all in the Brain

28 Telecommuting Future

30 Music in the Digital Age

32 News

36 The University at a Glance

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researchinstitutes.melbourne.edu

World-class expertise and knowledge -

all in the one place.

Our Research Institutes are taking new directions,

applying new ways of thinking, and bringing together

the best minds from over 50 disciplines. From energy

and sustainability, to biotechnology and neuroscience,

we’re all working together to make a positive

contribution to the world and provide cutting-edge

opportunities for the next generation of researchers.

The answers to some of the world’s most challenging problems lie in cross-disciplinary research.

A Global Research Powerhouse


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T he University of Melbourne has a long and proud tradition of research and teaching excellence. The

sheer scale of research facilities, institutes, researchers, fellows and postgraduates in the Parkville precinct, and surrounds, is without parallel in the southern hemisphere, and one of the very few such concentrations of research excellence worldwide.

It is an extraordinary time for major infrastructure projects at, and around, the original campus of the University of Melbourne. Over $1.6 billion of capital works are under way or soon to start – more than at any other time in the University’s history.

This edition of Research Review is dedicated to the timely theme of ‘Institutes, Innovation and Infrastructure’.

In the pages ahead we bring insights into the projects and research that will help build the Parkville precinct as a world centre of research and scholarship.

Recent announcements from the Commonwealth and State governments include the $1 billion Parkville Comprehensive Cancer Centre (Parkville CCC), after some 10 years of planning. The feature on page 5 shows how the defining characteristic of a comprehensive cancer centre is the linkage between research and treatment of the patient.

Medical research capacity will be boosted further by the University’s $210 million Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity and $100 million Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative (VLSCI), to be built on the site of the Elizabeth Towers hotel.

The Doherty Institute will co-locate the University Department of Microbiology and Immunology with a number of Victorian Government and World Health Organization laboratories, and the VLSCI will provide computational biology expertise and peak computing infrastructure to institutions throughout Victoria.

These projects have been made possible by Commonwealth and Victorian Government funding, with the Doherty Institute expected to open by the end of 2012.

On page 11 we profile Nobel Laureate Peter Doherty about his life as a scientist and about the Institute. On page 7 we feature new developments with the bionic eye. This is an example of strong research partnerships at work to tackle the problems of society.

The Special Report on pages 12–15 provides a snapshot of the magnitude and research capabilities of the Parkville Research Precinct.

Complementing these developments is the emergence of new multidisciplinary institutes. The new institutes, featured on pages 16–19, are one of the primary means of the University meeting the demands of society and engaging with the new ways of research required.

Research Review is a stimulating and inspiring publication. There are wonderful opportunities to interact with us or to become part of the ‘Melbourne Experience’. I hope you will be as excited as we are about these opportunities.

Professor Peter RathjenDeputy Vice-Chancellor (Research)

Welcome to the 2009 Edition of Research Review

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MELBOURNE LANDS KEY ROLE IN $1bn CANCER CENTREBY Rebecca Scott

Photo iStockphoto


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C ancer research and patient care is set to be revolutionised in Victoria after the

announcement of a world-class $1 billion Parkville Comprehensive Cancer Centre, by the Premier of Victoria, John Brumby and Federal Health and Ageing Minister Nicola Roxon in May this year.

The University of Melbourne will join other leading cancer research centres and treatment institutions under the one roof: the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne Health and the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research. The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research and the Royal Women’s Hospital are also partners in the project.

“With its critical mass of cancer expertise, the Parkville CCC will be a powerful tool in the fight against cancer. The University of Melbourne is delighted to be part of this exciting venture, which is truly a project of national significance,” said University of Melbourne Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis.

The Parkville CCC will be built on the site of the former Dental Hospital in Grattan Street and the southeastern corner of the Royal Melbourne Hospital city campus site.

Professor Davis says the generous funding from both the Commonwealth and Victorian governments will enable the partner organisations to create a world-class centre for cancer research, education and treatment in Australia.

Victorian Premier John Brumby and Federal Health and Ageing Minister Nicola Roxon announced the joint funding totalling $852.2 million for the Parkville CCC. The remainder will be funded from the sale of surplus sites, partner contributions and philanthropic donations. The University will contribute $25 million to the project.

The Parkville CCC will have more than 30,000 square metres of research space capable of accommodating up to 1,400 researchers and a clinical trials facility with 24 treatment places. There will be educational and training facilities, an outpatient clinic and six radiation therapy bunkers.

The Parkville CCC follows in the tradition of leading cancer centres around the world which have grown out of partnerships of hospitals, universities and research institutes:

> the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre at the Gerstner Sloan-Kettering Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in New York,

> the M D Anderson Cancer Centre at the University of Texas,

> the Kimmel Cancer Centre at Thomas Jefferson University; and

> the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Centre at Vanderbilt University.

Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, Professor James Angus, says building enduring partnerships is a major plank in the Faculty’s strategy.

“This landmark joint venture will benefit all Victorians. It will enable the University of Melbourne, as a public-spirited institution, to use its research and educational resources to enhance this great project.”

For the University of Melbourne, the Parkville Comprehensive Cancer Centre is a truly integrated approach to cancer, bringing together the University’s research, clinical and teaching and learning expertise in cancer to the Parkville Precinct.

“The defining characteristic of a comprehensive cancer centre is the linkage between research and treatment of the patient,” said Max Rogers, who has been appointed as the interim Executive Officer for the Parkville CCC collaborative project. Max Rogers is working with the six partners to facilitate the development of an interim incorporated joint venture.

“It’s about having all expertise into cancer under the one roof – to ultimately speed up the process from research bench to patient care at the bedside.”

“Also that it be a seamless experience for the patient care, from hospital admission,

involvement in clinical trials, through to specialist treatment,” he says.

In addition, Professor Angus points out that by creating a critical mass of intellectual and practical endeavour, the Parkville CCC will attract and retain world-class researchers and draw the best and the brightest to study and train in cancer at the University of Melbourne.

The University of Melbourne is already renowned as Australia’s leading biomedical enterprise, training more health professionals and attracting more nationally competitive grants for biomedical research than any other Australian university

Demolition works on the former Dental Hospital site will commence shortly with construction of the comprehensive cancer centre to begin in the first half of 2011. The centre is expected to be completed by 2015. RR

“The defining characteristic of a comprehensive cancer centre is the linkage between research and treatment of the Patient.”

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THE FUTURE OF SIGHTBY Emma O’Neill

An example of the microchip that will be inserted into retinas to help restore sight. Photo supplied courtesy of NICTA.


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I magine being able to cross a road by yourself, read a book and know what shirt you’re wearing. These were the humble dreams recently listed by a group of vision-

impaired people during a focus group outlining the impact restored vision would have on their lives.

The focus group was organised by Professor Jill Keeffe and her team at the Centre for Eye Research Australia (CERA), University of Melbourne. The session was not designed to identify challenges of being vision-impaired, but to refine functionality requirements for a new, advanced bionic eye being developed by the Bionic Vision Australia partnership of which the University of Melbourne is a key member.

The new device will enable unprecedented high resolution images to be seen by thousands of people with severely diminished sight, and could eventually allow people with severe vision loss to read large print and recognise faces.

Research Director of Bionic Vision Australia and Professor of Engineering at the University, Professor Anthony Burkitt, says the new device will ultimately be far superior to other retinal implants being investigated by groups throughout the world.

The new device will use a video camera – fixed to a person’s glasses – to capture images which are then translated into electrical impulses which stimulate electrodes inserted into the retina. These images are then sent to the visual cortex of the brain to stimulate the same area usually stimulated by visual cues. Over time the patient then learns to interpret these electronic impulses as parcels of light, and use these as useful vision.

Head of the Macular Research Unit at the Centre for Eye Research Australia (CERA), and Professor of Ophthalmology at the University, Dr Robyn Guymer, says the new device will do a lot more for patients than existing bionic eyes that simply enable people to differentiate between large and small objects and detect shadows.

According to Professor Burkitt, if Federal Government funding is received, the first retinal implant should take place at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital within two years and commercialisation of the device should take place within five years. Researchers at Bionic Vision Australia are currently conducting pre-clinical work involving safety and efficacy testing of the device.

“We are making sure that the device is safe to implant in a patient, that it functions as designed, and that it gives the expected form of electrical stimulation to the optic nerve fibres in the eye,” he says.

It is almost three decades since a team from the University developed the bionic ear, and Professor Burkitt says the same multidisciplinary approach – using biomedical engineers, clinical experts and neuroscientist from across the country – is the key to success with this development.

“To be successful, an implant must not only function reliably in terms of its electronics, it must also be made of biocompatible materials that will last the lifetime of the patient and it must also be possible for surgeons to implant the device without damaging either the device or the patient.”

Professor Guymer says it is a very exciting time for researchers at Bionic Vision Australia, and says that the hard work by all members of the group will soon pay off when the device is functioning and improving the quality of life for thousands. RR

“The new device will enable unprecedented high resolution images to be seen by thousands of people with severely diminished Sight.”

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THE NANO REVOLUTIONBY Silvia Dropulich

Photo iStockphoto


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T he world is poised to be revolutionised by nanomedicine [a combination

of nanotechnology and biomedicine], with global economic and social benefits, according to Professor Frank Caruso, an Australian Research Council Federation Fellow in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.

Professor Caruso seeks to make an impact on the world by mentoring the next generation of scientists and translating his research outcomes into benefits for the community.

“Nanotechnology is underpinning a number of developments in a diverse range of areas from computing to diagnostics and therapeutics,” Professor Caruso said.

“Breakthroughs in the area of nanotechnology are expected to have significant outcomes on society.”

Professor Caruso is Director of the University’s Centre for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology and leads the Nanostructured Interfaces and Materials research group in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.

He is a world leader in polymer science and technology research aimed at engineering polymer nanostructures, focusing on the self-assembly of polymers to produce advanced nano- and bio-materials.

Professor Caruso pioneered the modification of colloidal particles with ultrathin polymer

coatings. This has opened new opportunities for the creation of ‘smart’ colloidal materials, which have potential applications in medicine, diagnostics and catalysis.

Professor Caruso’s group has produced, for example, hollow polymer colloids that are being examined for targeting cells to help treat colorectal cancer. Once specifically targeted to cancerous tissue, the particles can be stimulated to release the drugs.

The group is also using polymers with tailored and well-defined macromolecular architectures to make a generational leap in the design of responsive ultrathin films.

“Nanotechnology is an enabling technology which covers a variety of disciplines,” Professor Caruso explains.

“My interest in it stems from the fact that you can introduce new properties into materials as a function of size and/or structure.

“If you can structure materials in a certain way or reduce their size, they can have new properties.

“And these new properties can then be used to engineer new systems.”

Professor Caruso completed his PhD in chemistry at the University of Melbourne (UniMelb). In 1997, he became an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Colloids and Interfaces in Germany, where he undertook research into advanced biomaterials, before returning to the University of Melbourne in 2002.

He has been awarded several awards and prizes, including the Max Planck Institute Research Excellence Award (1998); the German Federal Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Technology BioFuture Award (1999); the Royal Australian Chemical Institute Rennie

Memorial Medal (2000); the Royal Society of Chemistry–Royal Australian Chemical Institute Exchange Medal (2001); the Australian Academy of Science Le Fèvre Memorial Prize for significant contributions to the chemical/physical sciences (2005); and the Royal Australian Chemical Institute Australian Polymer Science and Technology Achievement Award (2006).

Professor Caruso was awarded the 2008 Woodward Medal in Science and Technology. The Medal recognises his outstanding body of published work exploring nanoengineered particles for a new generation of advanced drug delivery systems, aimed at improving healthcare and medical outcomes for the treatment of diseases such as cancer and AIDS.

Professor Caruso is an editor of the journal Chemistry of Materials (the number one journal in materials science by citations), published by the American Chemical Society, and is on the editorial advisory boards of Advanced Functional

Materials, International Journal of Nanomedicine and Nanoscale Research Letters. He was also a member of the ARC College of Experts panel for Engineering and Environmental Sciences (2005–2008). In 2009, he was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science.

Professor Caruso was also among the academics whose work was celebrated by the Australian Research Council in the book, Outcomes: Results of Research in the Real World 2008.

Some of the projects that Professor Caruso’s team is currently involved with include developing drugs for colon cancer with the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, and developing vaccine delivery systems with the Department of Immunology and Microbiology (UniMelb).

Research programs are also being undertaken with the Bionic Ear Institute on the bionic ear and delivering drugs to the inner ear to preserve hearing and prevent hearing loss.

A fourth research area, with the Baker Heart Medical Institute, focuses on the detection and diagnosis of cardiovascular disease. RR

“If you can structure materials in a certain way or reduce their size, they can have new properties.”

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THE SCIENCE OF SCEPTICSIM

BY Silvia Dropulich

Photo by Fred Kroh


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C limate change is not the professional speciality of world-renowned

immunologist Professor Peter Doherty. That he has written about it in A Light History of Hot Air provides a great insight into how this innovative thinker operates, and unveils a key element behind his scientific success.

“The reason I wrote the little book on hot air, which is only partly about climate change, was that I wanted to find out for myself,” Professor Doherty said.

“I don’t take things at face value, I always have to find out for myself.

“So, I read into it [climate change] quite a lot.

“Some of the science is very hard to read because it’s way outside my area of expertise, but I came away from it really convinced that this is a very substantial and serious issue.”

Peter Doherty originally trained in veterinary medicine. He is the first veterinarian or veterinary scientist to win a Nobel Prize. He started out hoping to save the world by helping to produce more food by being an agricultural scientist, but by the time he qualified as a vet, he realised that food production was more about agricultural scientist economics and politics than cows and sheep.

He then became interested in virology and immunology after reading books by Sir Macfarlane Burnet (another Australian Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology) and decided to do a PhD at Edinburgh University on the viral infection of sheep brains. After returning to Australia he accepted a postdoctoral position with the John Curtin School of Medical Research because there was interesting work there on immunity to viral infections.

Professor Doherty is driven by intellectual curiosity.

“I spend a lot time looking at the actual data rather than worrying too much whether it

fits somebody else’s ideas.”

“I’m very, very sceptical,” he said.

“I look at the science. I’m an experimental scientist. I spend a lot of time looking at the actual data, the actual results, rather than worrying too much whether it fits somebody else’s ideas or conceptual framework.

“I want to think it through for myself. Doing that has caused me to come up with some conclusions that are at times different – and that’s what winning the Nobel Prize means.”

Professor Doherty is passionate about trying to understand complex systems. Immunity is a very complex system.

“If we can dissect that complexity better we would do better with making, for example, vaccines,” he said.

Professor Doherty and Dr Rolf Zinkernagel from Switzerland won the 1996 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for work they did together in Canberra in the 1970s. The prize-winning discovery was made in 1973 at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University.

Their work explained how the body’s immune cells protect against viruses. They discovered how T cells recognised their target antigens in combination with major histocompatibility complex (MHC) proteins.

Viruses infected host cells and reproduced inside them. Killer T cells destroyed those infected cells so that the viruses could not reproduce. The pair discovered that, in order for killer T cells to recognise infected cells, they had to recognise two molecules on the surface of the cell – not only the virus antigen, but also a molecule of the major

histocompatibility complex (MHC).

Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity

Late last year the Federal Government awarded the University $90 million under the Higher Education Endowment Fund for the establishment of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity. Subject to securing additional financial assistance, the $210 million Institute will co-locate the University’s Department of Microbiology with a number of Victorian Government and World Health Organization laboratories.

This critical mass will create a new world-class national capability in infectious diseases in a broad-based partnership providing:

> shared vision, historical links, complementary skills, cohesive organisational structure and joint infrastructure

> broadened undergraduate and postgraduate education

> coordination of interdisciplinary research programs reflecting community and policy needs

> new high-throughput DNA sequencing and peak computing facilities

> enhanced national and international links attracting outstanding researchers, students and collaborations.

The Institute will pursue a number of integrated research programs in strategic areas, including emerging infections; respiratory infections (e.g. influenza); mycobacteria (e.g. TB); food-borne and enteric infections; blood-borne infections (e.g. HIV, hepatitis); and vaccine-preventable infections.

Academic virology, historically a strength in Australia, is

now in decline, according to Professor Doherty.

With their expertise in virus detection and surveillance, VIDRL and the WHO Collaborating Centre for Influenza will work with University of Melbourne researchers, creating enhanced national capability in this area. The Institute will provide outstanding advice to help protect us against diseases caused by micro-organisms.

It will help to eliminate many traditional pathogens that challenge us, and create a level of preparedness for the inevitable influenza pandemic, so that when it comes we are ready, Professor Doherty explains.

Professor Doherty describes his concern for environmental issues as a personal interest, not a professional activity. He has been watching it with some interest for some years now.

“The climate change issue has been sort of sneaking up on us,” he said.

“I believe the so-called sceptics, position is now being eroded enormously rapidly.

“Unless we act really aggressively on the climate change issue, we’re heading for a total catastrophe.”

Professor Doherty has also been very interested in literature and history. In fact, at one stage he thought about going into journalism, but he decided to do something practical and useful.

“That’s why I went to the veterinary school,” he said.

“I didn’t want to talk about things – I wanted to do something.

“I’m a doer, not a watcher – a player, not a fan.” RR

“I spend a lot time looking at the actual data rather than worrying too much whether it fits somebody else’s ideas.”

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SPECIAL REPORT: THE PARKVILLE RESEARCH PRECINCT• Co-location and centralisation• Critical mass and collaborative culture• Strong positioning and snowballing investments• Parkville snapshot• Research activity in the Parkville precinct


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In 2008 research organisations in the Parkville Precinct and immediate surrounds:

> engaged over 10,000 researchers - including 6500 research staff and 3500 postgraduate research students

> hosted one Nobel Prize winner, some 200 Fellows of learned Academies including 16 Fellows of the Royal Society and 68 Fellows of the Australian

> Academy of Sciences. It also hosts 9 of the 23 Australia Fellows and 16 Federation Fellows

> secured 26% of all National Health and Medical Research Council funding (part of the 41% of NHMRC funding attracted to the State of Victoria)

> produced 24% of Australia’s outputs in journals of highest impact factor (IF >20)

> produced around 10,000 publications1 including 4000 different instances of countries named in address by-lines from 97 countries

> produced 117 articles or reviews of impact factor greater than 20 in which collaborative country addresses numbered 267 from 55 countries

> created and commercialised numerous medical innovations, including the Bionic Ear, colony stimulating factors, Relenza®,

Recaldent®, retinal imaging, discovery of Rotavirus, vaccines, diagnostics, microsurgical instruments and antibiotics

> managed a $1.3B annual research expenditure.

These organisations have also created and commercialised numerous medical innovations, including the Bionic Ear, colony stimulating factors, Relenza®, Recaldent®, retinal imaging, discovery of Rotavirus, vaccines, diagnostics, microsurgical instruments, and antibiotics.

The research workforce within the Parkville Precinct is over 10,000 – 6600 research staff, including around 200 who are Fellows of learned Academies, and around 3500 postgraduate research students. Annual research expenditure is in the order of $1.3bn.

Co-location and centralisation

Many facilities sit side by side in the immediate surrounds of the University of Melbourne or within easy distance. The centralised position of the Parkville Precinct, adjacent to the central business district of Melbourne, enables the University to take advantage of downtown industry savvy, excellent public transport, quality inner city housing, and a rich cultural and intellectual life.

Critical mass and collaborative culture

Synergistic opportunities grow from the large numbers of high-quality co-located researchers and clinicians working across

faculties, hospitals, research institutes and specialist medical practices. A collaborative approach to research, student training and infrastructure provision has evolved over time and is fostered by current academic and political leaders.

Synergies and opportunities evolve constantly from the co-location of large numbers of high quality, researchers and clinicians in the Precinct’s faculties, hospitals, research institutes and specialist medical practices. Collaboration is a hallmark of research in the Precinct and this is now actively and explicitly fostered by the University leadership.

Strong positioning and snowballing investments

Building off this strong base, recent and ongoing investment approaching $5bn around the Parkville Precinct has been used to augment capabilities, bring new partners to the Precinct, facilitate interactions between basic and translational programs, enhance research infrastructure and build new capabilities in ICT, especially as it pertains to life sciences research.

These investments are expected to take the Parkville Precinct from being the premier site for life sciences research and training in the southern hemisphere to a major international player, and to position the Precinct as the key southern hemisphere hub for the generation, storage, interrogation and exchange of life sciences data.

The sheer quantity of life sciences research facilities, institutes, researchers, Fellows and postgraduate students in the Parkville Precinct and surrounds, and the comprehensive breadth of bioscience disciplines, is without parallel in the southern hemisphere and one of the very few such concentrations of research excellence worldwide.

* This data is based on information provided in annual reports and on websites, and will include a number of co-attributed publications.

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Parkville SNAPSHOT

INVESTMENTS IN THE PRECINCT’S NEW LIFE SCIENCES & ICT RESEARCH FACILITIES1. The Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative2. Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity (see feature on page 11)3. Parkville Comprehensive Cancer Centre 4. Centre for Neural Engineering and the Data Storage Centre5. Parkville and Austin Neurosciences Facility6. Institute for a Broadband Enabled Society (see story on page 19)7. The Royal Women’s Hospital (total rebuild)8. The Royal Children’s Hospital and Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (total rebuild)9. The Royal Dental Hospital of Melbourne and The Melbourne Dental School (total rebuild)10. Aikenhead Centre for Medical Discovery (proposal in collaboration)

EXISTING PRECINCT FACILITIES BEING EXPANDED11. BioGrid Australia12. National ICT Australia: Victorian Research Laboratory13. Bio21 Molecular Science and Biotechnology Institute14. Walter & Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research15. Australian Synchrotron

OTHER CONTRIBUTING PRECINCT FACILITIES16. University of Melbourne Faculty of Medicine Dentistry and Health Sciences17. University of Melbourne Faculty of Science18. University of Melbourne School of Engineering19. University of Melbourne School of Land & Environment20. University of Melbourne School of Veterinary Science21. Melbourne Health and the Royal Melbourne Hospital22. Peter McCallum Cancer Centre23. The Bionic Ear Institute24. Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research25. Austin LifeSciences26. Orygen Research Centre (see feature on page 23)27. Bernard O’Brien Institute of Microsurgery28. Centre for Eye Research Australia (see feature on page 7)29. Mental Health Research Institute30. National Ageing Research Institute31. St Vincent’s Institute of Medical Research and St Vincent’s Health32. CSIRO Molecular & Health Technologies Parkville33. Commonwealth Serum Laboratories Ltd

RESEARCH INSTITUTES, FACULTIES AND FACILITIES IN THE PARKVILLE PRECINCT


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D eputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Peter Rathjen believes the removal of barriers to new ideas and a ten-year outlook

for emerging institutes will give us the tools to cope with a challenging future.

The genie is out of the bottle and Peter Rathjen couldn’t be happier. “If you remove barriers, it turns out that academics are naturally engaging of others,” says Professor Rathjen.

“They are driven by ideas – that’s why they work in universities – and if you enable them to pursue ideas without restriction that’s exactly what they’ll do.”

After taking up the position of Deputy Vice-Chancellor in March 2008 with responsibility for research, world-renowned stem cell authority Professor Rathjen began a program to harness Melbourne’s research breadth to meet contemporary challenges.

“What we’re seeing is the marshalling of enormous intellectual energy across the institution,” he says.

“We’re seeing significant new projects and new funding bids that we hadn’t previously conceptualised. I think the reason is that our researchers are pursuing their interests in an interdisciplinary context, focused on problem solving.”

The first of the new multidisciplinary institutes was the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, followed by the Melbourne Institute of Materials, the Melbourne Energy Institute and the Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society. The May Federal Budget delivered funding for the Melbourne Neural Engineering Institute. Proposals for several other institutes spanning the breadth of University activity are well advanced.

The institutes are virtual rather than a physical presence, with an anticipated ten-year life span.

“It’s a conversation. We get top-down ideas and bottom-up ideas, we look for opportunities in the external marketplace, and from this complexity of internal and external drivers we synthesise directions forward.”

Professor Rathjen sees the new institutes as a means of the University meeting the demands of society and engaging with the new ways of research required.

“We have an aspiration to being a publicly-spirited institution and we have to inspect what it means to be publicly-spirited in our research agenda. One of the things that we have decided we would like to do is to harness that magnificent research strength that is Melbourne University in pursuit of the most pressing societal problems.”

According to Professor Rathjen the institutes will not necessarily manage the research projects. Rather they will allow researchers from across a range of disciplines to self-assemble to tackle what he terms “really big challenges”.

“Those challenges are largely defined by society rather than defined by the researchers themselves.”

To meet this shift to alignment with external problems Melbourne’s institutes build on the trend of the past 20 years away from single discipline alone to interdisciplinary research.

“We find within our institutes researchers from quite different disciplinary backgrounds coming together united by a wish to solve a common problem, and it seems it’s at those interfaces that much of the more exciting research is done,” he says.

Such a seismic shift in the focus of research calls into question the form of the existing foundation of research, the PhD.

“We are having to have a hard think about what a PhD program means for this University because our PhD structure is basically disciplinary-based,” Professor Rathjen says.

EMERGING INSTITUTESBY Shane Cahill



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“My understanding is that in the best US universities now more than 50 per cent of PhD students are enrolling in interdisciplinary projects and we’re going to have to find our way to enable that trend.”

Professor Rathjen believes the Melbourne Model’s core of depth and breadth will allow for such a transformation. But the change goes much further than curriculum or administrative issues.

“What we’re really exploring is research in the context and service of society. To advance that, you are going to have to bring together more than one disciplinary focus.”

So how is this new social engagement going to emerge?

“It’s a challenge. We’re going to have to try things and see which ones work and discard those things that don’t work. A lot depends on leadership.”

The prizes of success are substantial, with a brace of multi-million dollar projects and potential partnerships in development.

“The institutes are very powerful ways of articulating our research to the external world. We’re big and we’re complex and it has been hard for us to find a way to explain to others what we do.

“As we assemble under terms like energy or materials, those outside the University can look in and see what we do and from that we find we are becoming a target for various forms of partnerships, sometimes with external large corporations, sometimes with government bodies and sometimes with benefactors who are very interested in funding research and like to fund it through these large thematic approaches.”

The Melbourne institutes are also in the process of establishing partnerships with leading universities around the world.

Secondary education too will need to take account of these moves beyond single-discipline research.

“My sense is that cross-disciplinary research is based in disciplinary expertise. You’ve got to be trained in discipline-based skills, but you’ve got to combine these with the breadth that enables you to interpret your training in a social context.

“The Melbourne Model, with its emphasis on both depth and breadth, is ideally suited to this.”

What are the next areas for examination?

“We see these institutes having a natural life of about a decade and therefore we want to form them around areas that will be of enduring value. We want to make sure we tackle things that are bound to be important in ten years’ time.”

Emerging areas cited by Professor Rathjen include materials; energy and sustainable societies; social equity; creative cultures; brain science; and communication. RR

“The institutes are very powerful ways of articulating our research to the external world. We’re big and we’re complex and it has been hard for us to find a way to explain to others what we do.”

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Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute

The University has recently announced the appointment of Professor Craig Pearson as Director of the newly established Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute (MSSI), commencing full-time in September 2009.

Professor Pearson has an international record of academic and research achievement in agricultural and environmental policy and extensive senior leadership experience, including institution building and strategic change management. In his distinguished career Professor Pearson has worked in government, industry and universities and currently sits on the Advisory Board, International Centre for Sustainable Cities and a number of review and editorial boards.

The University late last year launched the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute – a key interdisciplinary research institute whose work advances the goal of a sustainable society in Australia and the Asia-Pacific region. MSSI addresses the socioeconomic aspects of environmental change as well as the biological and physical issues.

Research at the Institute focuses on issues surrounding the sharing of resources between humans and their physical environment, particularly in the areas of agriculture, sustainable cities, risk and resilience (including climate change), and water.

The Victorian Centre for Climate Change Adaptation Research and the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Network (Social Economic and Institutional Dimensions) are two significant climate change initiatives in the MSSI space. The Institute provides a portal to the important sustainability research undertaken at the University.

Melbourne Energy Institute

Concerns about climate change, diminishing resources and rising energy demand provide one of the key challenges of our time. To meet this challenge and advance research towards securing a sustainable, affordable energy supply into the future, the Melbourne Energy Institute takes an interdisciplinary and collaborative research approach.

By bringing disciplined-based research strengths together and by engaging with stakeholders outside the University, the Energy Institute offers the critical capacity to rethink the way we generate, deliver and use energy.

The Melbourne Energy Institute is an access point for industry, government and community groups seeking to work with leading researchers on innovative solutions in the following areas: new energy resources; developing new ways to harness renewable energy; more efficient ways to use energy; securing energy waste; and framing optimal laws and regulation to achieve energy outcomes.

The Energy Institute presents research opportunities in bioenergy, solar, wind and geothermal power; nuclear and cell options; and carbon capture and storage. It also engages in energy efficiency for urban planning, architecture, transport and distributed systems, and reliable energy transmission. Economic and policy questions constitute a significant plank of the Energy Institute’s research program and include: market regulation and demand; carbon trading; system modelling; climate change feedbacks; and social justice implications of energy policy.

The Melbourne Energy Institute brings together the work of over 150 researchers providing international leadership in energy research and delivering solutions to meet our future energy needs.

MELBOURNE MATERIALS INSTITUTE

The Melbourne Materials Institute is the entry point for researchers and industry seeking to work with leading researchers at the University of Melbourne on innovative solutions in the materials science domain.

Advances and innovations in materials science are essential if we are to the bridge the great problems of our age – in water, medicine and energy – and their solutions.

One of the global challenges we face in this century is reinventing the use of materials, including more nearly complete cycling of technological materials, to help capture the CO2 from our carbon fuel-burning power plants, to provide universal access to clean, safe water, to extract energy from the sun more effectively, and to create the new generation of batteries so that we can escape our dependence on oil and convert to electric cars.

These problems have no simple solutions: they are big, complicated and multifaceted, requiring large-scale, sophisticated interdisciplinary responses.

The Melbourne Materials Institute brings together researchers from a range of disciplines – physics, engineering and biomedicine – capable of providing an interdisciplinary perspective to unlock these intractable issues. We aim to link with industry to provide sustainable real-world applications that solve these problems. We believe that the new industries of the middle of the 21st century will arise from fundamental advances in areas of our expertise.

The Melbourne Materials Institute has established strengths in the nanomedicine, energy, quantum technology and photonics fields with a strong track record of delivering advances in fundamental science leading to innovation and commercialisation. Together with industry, we will provide the enabling technologies for a more sustainable future.


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Melbourne Brain Institute

The newest institute to be added to the University of Melbourne’s stable of cross-disciplinary research institutes is the Melbourne Brain Institute. MBI will focus the University’s neuroscience research activities to optimise productivity and impact, increase funding for research in this area and enable more efficient use of existing facilities and infrastructure. The institute will be responsible for enhancing interdisciplinarity in neuroscience through stewardship of cross-faculty activities which involve collaboration with researchers from areas such as Engineering, Optometry and Vision Sciences, Ophthalmology, Law, Economics, and Social Sciences. It will provide an international neuroscience research-based focus that will attract and retain talented researchers from around the world in addition to the best postdoctoral researchers and research higher degree students; develop new research ventures to address significant gaps in the University’s knowledge base in the neurosciences; and enhance the University’s connectivity with the community and with key stakeholders in order to optimise research outcomes and knowledge transfer and maximise the translation of neuroscience research to clinical outcomes.

The Institute will work through a small core unit that will draw together key researchers and administrators whose activities will be enhanced to meet a broader objective, namely to promote interdisciplinary research in the neurosciences across the University of Melbourne. The core unit will create opportunities for links between the University’s researchers in areas such as disease, social context and health costs, thus strengthening University-wide responsiveness to neuroscience-related matters. The Institute will also provide a focused opportunity to collaborate with institutional, hospital and commercial partners, in order to maximise research outcomes, facilitate knowledge transfer and strengthen the standing of the University of Melbourne as a leader in research in the neurosciences nationally and internationally. Professor Trevor Kilpatrick, world-renowned MS researcher, has been appointed as the inaugural director for this initiative.

Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society (IBES)

The Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society (IBES) is a cross-disciplinary research institute dedicated to innovations in broadband products and services that benefit Australian society.

As this publication was going to press, the Victorian Government had just announced that it would provide $2 million for the new Institute, which is the nation’s first cross-disciplinary research institute dedicated to maximising the community benefits of broadband technologies.

Professor Rod Tucker, Director of IBES, says the Institute will source skills and resources of leading University researchers and 10 major industry leaders. Together they will develop and test new products and services which will benefit society, in areas such as e-health, e-education, e-commerce, and environmental monitoring.

IBES has attracted the support of leading global and local companies to join its research program. They include Cisco, Microsoft, Alcatel-Lucent, Telstra, Ericsson, NEC Australia, Optus, Allied Telesis, Pacific Broadband Networks, and Haliplex. The research will also be enhanced by the support of Bell Labs and NICTA, Australia’s national research centre of excellence in Information and Communication Technology.

Professor Tucker says IBES will serve as a national and international focus for research and innovation across the full spectrum of social, business and technological activities associated with and influenced by the new Australian National Broadband Network.

The strong support of industry, coupled with the support and commitment of the State Government of Victoria, positions IBES to play a key role in the development of an Australian industry that is ready for the true broadband revolution, according to Professor Tucker.

“IBES has attracted the support of leading global and local companies to join its research program.”


researchinstitutes.melbourne.edu

Unlimited Research Possibilities

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Photo by Joe Vittorio


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C reating a physical and intellectual environment that fosters world-class multidisciplinary research can inspire and motivate scientists

to conduct research of benefit to human health and the environment. At the Bio21 Institute, building critical mass in key platform technologies was part of this ‘big picture’ strategy. In an increasingly competitive international stage, the importance of building capabilities in key areas, coupled with world-class infrastructure, is vital for the continued growth of Victoria’s biotechnology sector and the Institute’s leadership role in the field.

Recognising the opportunities and challenges presented by the life sciences revolution, the University of Melbourne harnessed research strengths in the science and engineering disciplines underpinning innovation in the biotechnology sector. Fundamental to the research capability was building critical mass in key platform technologies that allow researchers to access state-of-the-art facilities that enhance their research programs.

At Bio21, the technologies that underpin contemporary biotechnology include nuclear magnetic resonance, mass spectrometry for proteomics and metabolomics, high resolution electron microscopy and bioinformatics. As the cornerstone of the Institute’s biotechnology programs, these core platform technologies help researchers understand the composition, structure and interaction of molecules and then use this knowledge to understand the fundamental biological processes of life and in biotechnology applications.

Core enabling molecular technologies, complemented by technical expertise and know-how, provide a firm base for the development of a dynamic multidisciplinary research environment – an environment likely to generate fundamental research and commercial outcomes of major significance on the world scene that otherwise could not have been achieved. Such a strategic alignment has enabled the University to capitalise on the opportunities generated by the ongoing genomics revolution.

Core Platform Technologies at Bio21 Institute

The key facilities of Bio21 include the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Centre, proteomics and mass spectrometry capability, an electron microscopy suite, and animal house facilities. A recent addition to the Institute’s capability is the establishment of the Metabolomics Australia (MA) infrastructure facility.

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) underpins drug discovery R&D initiatives. It provides users with 3D structures of a range of biological and synthetic molecules, including proteins and drug candidates. It is a valuable tool for medical diagnostics, identifying toxins and metabolomics, and developing pesticides. The Institute’s NMR Cave is home to nine spectrometers from the University Departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry & Molecular Biology and the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research, and includes one of the largest in Australia, the 800 MHz NMR Spectrometer.

The Proteomics and Mass Spectrometry Facility provides specialist equipment and expertise for analysing small molecules

and proteins and includes characterisation, peptide synthesis, sequencing and post-translational modification. A stable of more than 10 spectrometers are co-located at Bio21.

Equipped with five state-of-the-art electron microscopes, the Institute’s $10m Electron Microscopy Unit and clean room is a key facility designed for physical sciences, life sciences and engineering applications.

The capability includes high resolution cryo-TEM and expertise to provide visualisation of sub-cellular details and three-dimensional information important across the bioscience applications.

Metabolomics Australia: Headquartered at the Bio21 Institute and School of Botany at the University of Melbourne, the MA facility is funded by Australia’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS), a Federal and State Government-funded initiative. The establishment of the MA national infrastructure facility brings critical mass on a national scale, minimises duplication, and strengthens opportunities for researchers across Australia to allow for study of metabolic processes. This is an emerging field of research relevant to the development of biomarkers for disease and health, environmental monitoring, monitoring of GMOs and the understanding of biological processes in animals, plants and micro-organisms.

Meanwhile, exciting new developments in the areas of high-performance computing, data storage and bioinformatics are set to revolutionise Victoria’s life sciences sector. The OptiPortal – high definition video

and audio technology – allows real-time interactive collaboration between researchers worldwide. Similarly one of the world’s largest life sciences ‘supercomputers’ will allow researchers to explore large databases of information and create complex analytical models to help with the development of drugs and treatments tackling life-threatening diseases such as cancer and diabetes. RR

Bio21 INSTITUTE BUILDS RESEARCH CRITICAL MASS

BY Helen Varnavas

“The University of Melbourne has harnessed research strengths in the science and engineering disciplines underpinning innovation in the biotechnology sector.”

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MENTAL DISORDERS A MAJOR PROBLEM FOR THE YOUNGBY Silvia Dropulich

Photo by Dave Tacon


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P rofessor Patrick McGorry’s team at the ORYGEN Research Centre, Victoria, has

recently been awarded $10 million to continue its wide-ranging studies into mental disorders in young people.

The studies examine neurobiological, personal and social factors that affect the way a person moves from early symptoms to chronic disability, to reduce the impact of illness on a young person’s life.

Professor McGorry has contributed significantly to research in the area of early psychosis over the past 20 years, playing a pivotal role in the development of service structures and treatments specifically targeting the needs of young people with emerging or first-episode psychosis.

“Mental disorders are a major cause of disability in Australia, especially for young people,” Professor McGorry said.

“We have developed a clinical staging model covering the earliest symptoms through persistent disorder to chronic disability,” he said.

“We are investigating neurobiological, personal and social factors which increase the risk of progression through these stages, and novel treatment strategies which may prevent or delay onset and relapse, reduce the impact of illness, and promote recovery.

“Major public health benefits and better understanding of the onset and progression of illness will result.”

Seventy-five per cent of mental disorders emerge before the age of 24, mostly between 12 and 25 years, and a focus on young people is essential for early intervention research, according to Professor McGorry.

The clinical picture of mental illness in young people is often complicated, with mixed symptom patterns, and frequent comorbid substance use.

“Our aim is to identify as soon as possible young people who are developing emerging mental health problems and potentially serious mental disorders such as psychoses, but also a full range of potentially serious mental disorders and substance use problems in young people,” Professor McGorry said.

“Early diagnosis is a much more cost-effective way to treat people.

“That’s well established in cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and anywhere else.

“It’s been a difficult struggle to get that accepted in psychiatry, but now there’s increasing evidence – particularly for psychotic disorders, but also for other kinds of potentially severe mental illnesses – that the same principle applies.”

There are a lot of theories about what contributes to onset

of psychiatric disorder and psychosis in particular, Professor McGorry explains. The genetic risk was the best-established, but stressful life events could also be contributing factors.

More knowledge about how disorders emerged and what actually brought them on was needed.

“There are theories about abnormal brain development in adolescence and early adult life, some subtle abnormalities with that process, but it’s difficult to be any more specific than that at this stage,” Professor McGorry said.

“So the best we can do actually is this whole idea of early detection and early intervention so that we don’t wait for someone to be in extremis before we actually help the young person.

“Preventing in a primary sense is still beyond us, but early intervention is not beyond us.”

From 1987 to 1993 Professor McGorry was an Associate Investigator on the NHMRC-funded Schizophrenia Research Unit at Royal Park Hospital and is the founding and current Executive Director of ORYGEN Youth Health and ORYGEN Research Centre.

Professor McGorry has been successful in gaining numerous national and international grants from a variety of sources over many years and is currently the Chief Investigator on an NHMRC Program Grant and a Centre of

Clinical Excellence Grant. He has published over 300 journal articles, chapters and books and has presented at many national and international conferences. As well as his contributions to the field of early psychosis, Professor McGorry has interests in the homeless, refugees and torture survivors, youth suicide, youth substance use and the treatment of emerging personality disorder.

He is currently the Chair of the Executive Committee for the National Youth Mental Health Foundation (headspace), the Treasurer of the International Early Psychosis Association and Editor-in-chief of Early Intervention in Psychiatry journal. He is also a member of the International Society for the Psychological Treatment of Schizophrenia and Related Psychoses, the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the International Association for Cognitive Psychotherapy, the Constitution Committee of the World Federation of Societies of Biological Psychiatry, the Organising Committee of the Section on Schizophrenia of the World Psychiatric Association, and the Founding Board of Directors of the Schizophrenia International Research Society (SIRS). Professor McGorry has been awarded many prizes for his significant contributions to education, research and clinical psychiatry. RR

“Mental disorders are a major cause of disability in Australia, especially for young people.”

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Photo by John Rayner


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GREENING OUR ROOFTOPSBY Nerissa Hannink

W ith climate change predicted to bring higher temperatures and lower rainfall to large parts of Australia,

researchers in the Departments of Resource Management & Geography and Forest & Ecosystem Science are investigating the potential of green infrastructure to adapt our cities and lessen these impacts.

Urban green infrastructure incorporates parks, gardens, urban agriculture, street trees and new technologies such as green roofs and green walls to reduce the energy demands of cities and create a more pleasant environment for its inhabitants.

Green roofs are roofs with vegetation growing in a lightweight designed substrate on a specialised drainage layer. They are a climate change adaptation technology that is widespread in Europe and North America, but is rarely used and still untested in Australia.

A recently awarded Australian Research Council Linkage Grant of $380,000 will develop green roofs suitable for the Australian climate. Dr Nick Williams, based at the School of Land and Environment’s Burnley campus, is leading the project and says that Australian climatic conditions are different to those in the northern hemisphere, meaning that we can not easily import green roof substrates or plants from overseas and have to find our own solutions.

“Our research will significantly progress the Australian green roof industry by overcoming barriers to their implementation,” said Dr Williams.

“Hopefully this will lead to multiple environmental, economic and health benefits at a variety of scales.”

Benefits of green roofs for individual buildings include greater energy efficiency, increased roof life and the attenuation of noise.

Environmental benefits include biodiversity habitat, reduced volume and improved quality of stormwater flows and cooling of the urban environment through evapotranspiration. This further reduces urban energy use and greenhouse emissions, while reducing human health risks during heatwaves.

The project also involves Dr Stefan Arndt and Mr John Rayner and is co-funded by Melbourne Water, the Department of Sustainability and Environment, the City of Melbourne and the Committee for Melbourne.

The new grant will enable the development of new green roof substrates from Australian resources and will identify local plants that can survive the extreme conditions on green roofs.

The need for this research was demonstrated by the results of a pilot study at the Burnley campus which was established in July 2008.

“Almost all plant species that were planted on Australia’s first experimental green roof died over the summer of 2008/2009,” said Mr Rayner.

“The conditions were extreme this summer but our results demonstrate that further research to identify plants that can survive on Australian green roofs is a priority.”

The research is also needed by local industries. “We are constantly getting requests from architects and landscape architects who are keen to install green

roofs on buildings. They need information on which plants work best and what substrates they can use,” said Mr Rayner.

Other green infrastructure research being conducted by Dr Steve Livesley and colleagues in the School of Land and Environment includes investigations into the greenhouse gas balances of garden management. Studies include the measurement of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrogen dioxide fluxes in lawn versus mulched garden beds and the quantification of the environmental benefits of urban street trees.

A team led by Dr Geoff Connellan and Professor Nigel Stork at the Burnley campus has also launched a website called ‘Smart Garden Watering’: www.smartgardenwatering.org.au

The site helps gardeners work out the best species for their location, calculate the amount of water needed through the year and plan for water tanks to replace mains water. The website was designed by the University of Melbourne’s Department of Information Systems with support from the Smart Water Fund.

This leading-edge research into green infrastructure is providing a new focus for the Burnley campus, putting it at the forefront of urban sustainability. RR

“Green roofs are a climate change adaptation technology that is widespread in Europe and North America, but is rarely used and still untested in Australia.”

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IT’s ALL IN THE BRAINBY Silvia Dropulich

Photo by Joe Vittorio


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F or Professor Sam Berkovic the brain is the most complex and fascinating organ in the body. The major focus of Professor

Berkovic’s work involves the study of the genetic basis of epilepsy. He and his research team showed that many types of epilepsy have a significant genetic component.

Once this was established, Professor Berkovic’s team looked deeper into the illness and, with collaborators at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Adelaide, discovered a number of new inherited epilepsy syndromes, which led to identifying the first gene for epilepsy.

Professor Berkovic is currently leading an NHMRC-funded Program entitled ‘Epilepsy: Molecular Basis and Mechanisms in the Era of Functional Genomics’. The study focuses on epilepsy through a number of different avenues. One is to continue to study the genes that are involved in epilepsy. Animal models with the identical genetic change as people with epilepsy have been developed and are being studied.

The Program will also carry out investigations such as magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomorgraphy on people with epilepsy. This will improve the understanding of the relationship between abnormalities in genes and the brain structure, and epilepsy.

“This multi-faceted Program of epilepsy reserach aims to determine how gene changes causes seizures,” Professor Berkovic said.

“The different forms of research will, when combined, help the team towards their goal of developing new and better forms of diagnosis and treatment for people with epilepsy.”

Professor Berkovic is Director of the Comprehensive Epilepsy Program at Austin Health, Director of the Epilepsy Research Centre, and Scientific Director of the Brain Research Institute. He is Laureate Professor in the Department of Medicine, Austin Health/Northern Health at the University of Melbourne, and is an adjunct Chair in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery at McGill University, Montreal, Canada.

The son of holocaust survivors, Dr Berkovic says he always wanted to be a doctor. He does not believe that his view of humanity has been shaped or affected by stories of the holocaust, but he believes that as a first-generation Australian he was influenced by the work ethic of his migrant parents, who worked extremely hard to get themselves financially established.

None of Professor Berkovic’s immediate family or circle of friends are diagnosed with epilepsy – his interest in the condition is derived from the condition itself.

Professor Berkovic’s first job at the Austin was as a neurology intern in 1978. The first physician he worked for was Dr Peter Bladin, Austin’s first neurologist, who formed the neurology unit. Dr Berkovic found Dr Bladin highly inspirational. Epilepsy was an area that Dr Bladin was very passionate about.

“When you’re dealing with epilepsy, you’re not merely dealing with the physical aspects of a condition,” Professor Berkovic said.

“If you’ve got a broken leg, everybody can relate to a broken leg,” he said.

“It hurts, your leg doesn’t work, you fix it and that’s kind of about what it is.

“Everybody can understand that.

“But with something like epilepsy where you’re rendered suddenly and unpredictably unconscious, and you’re placed suddenly and unpredictably in sort of embarrassing circumstances, and you lose control – that’s something extremely difficult for people to deal with.

“Epilepsy is a much more complicated condition and there’s a major sort of psychological element to dealing with it.”

As far back as Hippocrates (the great Greek physician of 2000 years ago), there has

been a lot of mythology, superstition and prejudice against people with epilepsy. At the time of Hippocrates epilepsy was called the ‘sacred disease’.

In some cultures epilepsy sufferers were seen as special, but for many it is also seen as a condition that should be expunged.

“Sadly, there are still hangovers today from those discriminatory aspects of epilepsy,” Dr Berkovic said.

“And I think that this is because of the difficulty in relating to the suffering and change in the person with epilepsy, who is normal one moment and literally seizing the next.”

The brain is an electrical organ, Professor Berkovic explains.

Electrical changes can be measured by EEGs, recorded by wires on the head. The problem or challenge is in the fact that the circuits are organised at levels beyond human comprehension. The ability to find the genes sheds some light on knowledge that is fundamental to the biology of epilepsy and understanding how and why the circuits may go haywire.

Professor Berkovic observes that compared to his days as an intern at the Austin, the technology that is now available for genetic studies has ‘exploded’.

“It’s a totally different environment today,” Professor Berkovic said.

“And it keeps getting more interesting.

“From the perspective of genetics, I believe individuals will have much more understanding and control over their destinies in terms of their personal choices about lifestyle.” RR

“Epilepsy is a complicated condition and there’s a major psychological element to dealing with it.”

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TELECOMMUTING FUTUREBY Shane Cahill

Photo by Fred Kroh


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S uperfast broadband will transform the way we work and offers great environmental benefits.

Picture an airline terminal anywhere in the developed world. It is 7 am. There they are in their thousands – expectant holidaymakers, world-weary backpackers, eager first-timers. All the usual suspects.

Minus one – the commuter business class. Barely a suit in sight and no sign of Qantas Club members. No laptops on knees, spreadsheets unravelled or urgent barked mobile conversations.

If Laureate Professor and Director of the ARC Special Research Centre for Ultra-Broadband Information Networks (CUBIN) Rod Tucker has his way, in the next decade the notion of flying to another city for a business meeting with a same day return will be recalled as another example of discarded 20th century excess and madness.

“The new fibre to the premises (FTTP) superfast broadband network will transform broadband in Australia,” says Professor Tucker.

“It will have a huge social impact and produce profound cultural changes. There will be a new set of ways people do things from business to community activities to travel.”

FTTP will deliver broadband services via optical fibre to 90 per cent of Australian homes, schools and workplaces at speeds of 100 megabits per second – 100 times faster than services currently used by most people.

People living in more remote parts of Australia will have access to broadband of 12 megabits per second delivered by next generation wireless and satellite technologies.

“Really effective telecommuting will definitely happen and it will replace a significant portion of current business travel,” says Professor Tucker. “Rather than flying to Sydney and back in a day at a cost of a thousand dollars

and a tonne of CO2, business will be done using very high definition videoconferencing.”

The energy savings of telecommuting over travel are as impressive as they are undeniable.

While a return flight from Melbourne to Sydney for a business meeting produces 500 kg of CO2 emissions per person each way, six hours of videoconferencing between the two cities produces only 5 kg of CO2 emissions per person.

According to Professor Tucker the new broadband will deliver an ‘in the room’ simulation.

“Put it this way for example: if the conference is about negotiations, the very high definition video will produce an immersive environment where you can follow eye movements and even see who is sweating.”

Beneath the changes to long-held patterns of behaviour that the new broadband will usher in lie unprecedented opportunities for energy savings.

To achieve this goal, the growth of electricity used by the internet – expected to rise from 0.5 per cent to 1.0 per cent of the national total in 2020 – has to be slowed.

First priority is to prevent ‘energy bottlenecks’ occurring in providing the electricity needed to power the equipment used by the internet.

The internet has rapidly evolved from its initial simple functions to now encompass e-commerce, banking and a wide range of information activities containing increasingly complex image and multimedia content.

This functionality is delivered by specialised equipment housed in large facilities using large amounts of energy to provide information to users scattered around the globe. Energy use by these data centres is 1.0 per cent of the global total and doubled between 2000 and 2006.

“It is essential we make the best use of renewable energy by locating computing and

storage resources near sources of renewable energy,” Professor Tucker says.

“And if we are going to move data to follow the sun and the winds we will have to greatly expand data transport capacity and find efficiency trade-offs.”

At the same time replacement of high energy activities such as much business travel by efficient internet use can significantly reduce carbon emissions.

“There is potential for enormous carbon emissions savings with appropriate use of the internet to replace existing business, community and leisure activities,” says Professor Tucker.

“The internet and associated ICT must work efficiently to ensure these opportunities are achieved.”

However, energy savings are not all one way in favour of the internet. If the internet’s capacity to deliver information virtually instantaneously is not critical, airmailing data on high-capacity USB memory sticks uses less energy than sending the data over the internet.

And what about the environmental cost of spam?

McAfee, the antivirus software company, recently did a study of the environmental effect of spam emails. Based on work carried out by Professor Tucker’s group, McAfee calculated that globally, annual spam energy use totals 33 billion kilowatt-hours. The greenhouse impact of these spam emails is the same as the greenhouse impact of three million passenger cars.

Professor Tucker is also the Director of the new Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society (IBES), which is dedicated

to ensuring this mix of next generation efficiencies and large-scale savings is transferred into benefits for society

“The Institute will focus on new applications of broadband, including remote and distance medicine and distance education. Widespread usage of broadband in rural and remote areas will be as great an advance as when radio first allowed the School of the Air to be brought to children in remote areas of Australia,” Professor Tucker says.

The new National Broadband Network will also take Australia from lagging in internet technology to world leadership, with enormous resultant commercial opportunities.

“Australia will be the first western country to have universal broadband and will be one of the lead nations in the field after having been backward for so long. Australia will be up there with world leaders South Korea and Japan.

“There are great opportunities for Australian businesses to develop and export applications and services. Australia has the potential to be the world leader in broadband products for other western nations, while there will be an enormous boost for research.”

But will it all end up on our mobiles? According to Professor Tucker, most unlikely.

“Mobile use of conferencing will grow, but only for voice and one-person videoconferencing,” says Professor Tucker.

So while the day in Sydney might be on the way out, a bigger and better large-screen office theatre is on the way in. RR

See also: www.researchinstitutes.melbourne.edu

“The new fibre to the premises (FTTP) superfast broadband network will transform broadband in Australia.”

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Photo iStockphoto


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MUSIC IN THE DIGITAL AGEBY Katherine Smith

N ew software called MelodicMatch, designed for people who “make a living by understanding how music is put together” is enabling

researchers to formulate and identify musical patterns, and the relationships between them.

Developed in the C++ programming language by Philip Wheatland, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of the VCA and Music, MelodicMatch enables musicologists to make comparisons in large numbers of musical pieces that might not be possible manually.

Mr Wheatland, a Melbourne music and education graduate, spent three years teaching secondary school music before crossing over into IT. While working as a programmer, he became aware of the possibilities of computer-based musical analysis of this type, and set about to create a suitable application.

“MelodicMatch is not for the average music buff, but could become a valuable tool for musicologists, composers, and people who edit music or put together new editions of printed music,” he says.

Mr Wheatland’s doctoral thesis involves several case studies of the successful practical application of the software.

Dr Jan Stockigt, a musicologist at the School of Music (Parkville), has been working on the music of Dresden in the 1730s, a golden age for music that saw a great flourishing of opera and song.

Mr Wheatland explains that in that period, composers would often have a particular singer in mind when writing new music, but this is not necessarily documented.

MelodicMatch is helping to match specific singers to individual pieces, thereby shedding new light on the intricate inter-relationships of composers, musicians, singers and courtly patronage of the first Augustan age.

“The analysis can’t be absolutely conclusive, but can provide additional information to build the body of evidence that musicologists draw from,” he says.

“I have also been analysing very early music from the sixteenth century, and the software is proving useful in isolating particular structures of music from that time which might otherwise escape detection.

“The unique quality of MelodicMatch is that is can present results in a highly visual manner.

“Its presentation complements traditional music notation by enabling music researchers to see the outline of a large-scale piece and to throw into relief the relationships between melodies, rhythms and lyrics.

“In the hands of a skilled analyst, MelodicMatch can also help to reveal the compositional processes that are common to a collection of works.”

Philip Wheatland (BMus, BMusEd 1991) is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of the VCA and Music. MelodicMatch is available commercially via the University of Melbourne’s Curriculum Licensing Services. The software is described fully at www.melodicmatch.com.Contact: [email protected] RR

“The unique quality of MelodicMatch is that it can present results in a highly visual manner.”

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RESEARCH NEWS

A $115m HEARing Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) and the University of Melbourne’s new state-of-the-art Audiology, Hearing and Speech Sciences facility was co-launched recently by Senator Kim Carr.

Hearing loss affects one in six Australians, with the real economic cost estimated to be $11.7 billion per annum – with an aging population and increasing noise in our everyday lives, prevalence and costs are projected to rise.

The HEARing CRC is a consortium of Australia’s foremost hearing research, clinical and industry organisations. The CRC will receive $32.5 million in Commonwealth funding over seven years; funding began in the 2007 financial year.

With additional funds as cash and in-kind contributions from the five core members (Australian Hearing, Cochlear Ltd Pty, Macquarie University, Siemens Ltd Pty and the University of Melbourne) and

21 support members, the total investment in hearing research will be over $115 million.

The HEARing CRC was launched in conjunction with the opening of the University’s world-leading Audiology, Hearing and Speech Sciences building, which is the CRC’s new home.

The University’s new $3.5 million custom-designed facility at 550 Swanston Street has been a major refurbishment project. It contains the largest sound booth in Australia for cutting-edge acoustic research, high-spec engineering facilities, as well as state-of-the-art AV equipment for teaching and research.

The building also houses the University’s Audiology Clinic, which like the Department of Otolaryngology, retains close connections with the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital and its world-renowned Cochlear Implant Clinic.

Research advanced by Fulbright Scholars

Restoring human vision, reducing carbon emissions, fitter gamers and fire regeneration for grapevines will be addressed by four University of Melbourne researchers named as winners of this year’s Australian Fulbright Scholarship.

The bionic eye will be closer to reality thanks to the work of award recipient, Dr Byron Wicks from the University’s Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering.

Dr Wicks will travel to Berkeley with his scholarship to further work he has been doing with the National Information Communication Technology Australia (NICTA) Victorian Research Laboratory.

“We aim to develop a device that will restore human vision lost to diseases which destroy the photoreceptor cells in the retina but leave the subsequent neurons such as retinal ganglion cells relatively intact and functional,” he said (see story page 6).

“These diseases include retinitis pigmentosa and age-related macular degeneration and are responsible for 48 per cent of all blindness in Australia.”

The University’s other winners were:

> Dr Tina Bell, who will travel to the US and research the effects of smoke from fires on grapevines.

> Floyd Mueller, a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne, who will travel to Stanford University to help designers create video games that help make you fit.

> Colin Scholes, a Research Fellow at the Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies (CO2CRC) at the University, who will head to the University of Texas to work on cheaper ways to minimise carbon emissions.

The four researchers were among 23 recipients of the prestigious award, which is issued annually by the Australian-American Fulbright Commission.

Measuring the size and age of the universe has won University of Melbourne Professor Jeremy Mould and his international colleagues the prestigious 2009 Gruber Prize for Cosmology, announced by the Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation in the United States.

Professor Jeremy Mould of the University of Melbourne’s School of Physics shares the prize worth $US500,000 with Wendy Freedman, Director of the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Pasadena, California, and Robert Kennicutt, Director of the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge in England.

The award recognises the astronomers’ leadership in the definitive measurement of the Hubble constant, which explains the expansion rate of the universe since its beginning, thus connecting the universe’s size with its age.

The findings of the Hubble Space Telescope Key Project in 1999 have since been confirmed and recognised as one of the most important measurements in astronomy.

The expansion rate of the universe has been hotly debated since Edwin Hubble’s original discovery in 1929 that galaxies were rushing away from each other at a rate proportional to their distance, i.e. the further apart, the faster the recession.

“We were able to greatly improve the accuracy of the measurement” says Professor Mould. “We are receiving this prize now because a lot of additional work has confirmed our findings, allowing the prize givers to be very confident of our results.”

World-leading facility opened for Australian hearing research

Hubble constant wins Professor prestigious prize


32

The University’s new Economics and Commerce building has been awarded a five-star Green Star Education Pilot rating by the Green Building Council of Australia (GBCA).

And it has also been short-listed for the Victorian Premier’s Sustainability Award, which recognises the hard work and innovation of the business and community sectors to reduce their carbon footprint and resource use.

Announcing the short-list, Victorian Environment and Climate Change Minister Gavin Jennings said the finalists all share a vision for a sustainable present and future and the ingenuity to see it through.

The new Economics and Commerce building, affectionately known as ‘The Spot’, is the largest construction in Australia to be awarded the five-star rating under the Green Building Council of Australia’s Pilot Educational Tool.

The 25,000-square-metre 12-storey building forms part of the southern gateway to the University campus and houses a range of collaborative and individual teaching spaces, open access laboratories, theatres, student break-out areas and academic and administrative offices for the Economics & Commerce Faculty.

The building’s rating is part of a pilot for education institutions designed to improve the health and wellbeing of students. It includes environmentally sustainable initiatives including a double-glazed facade with the ability to minimise glare, features for rainwater collection, low-energy light fittings, and bike storage.

Current modelling indicates the ‘green’ building will result in carbon reductions of 73 per cent and water use reductions of 90 per cent compared with a conventional education building of the same size and use.

See: www.pb.unimelb.edu.au/building_projects.html

Measuring the size and age of the universe has won University of Melbourne Professor Jeremy Mould and his international colleagues the prestigious 2009 Gruber Prize for Cosmology, announced by the Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation in the United States.

Professor Jeremy Mould of the University of Melbourne’s School of Physics shares the prize worth $US500,000 with Wendy Freedman, Director of the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Pasadena, California, and Robert Kennicutt, Director of the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge in England.

The award recognises the astronomers’ leadership in the definitive measurement of the Hubble constant, which explains the expansion rate of the universe since its beginning, thus connecting the universe’s size with its age.

The findings of the Hubble Space Telescope Key Project in 1999 have since been confirmed and recognised as one of the most important measurements in astronomy.

The expansion rate of the universe has been hotly debated since Edwin Hubble’s original discovery in 1929 that galaxies were rushing away from each other at a rate proportional to their distance, i.e. the further apart, the faster the recession.

“We were able to greatly improve the accuracy of the measurement” says Professor Mould. “We are receiving this prize now because a lot of additional work has confirmed our findings, allowing the prize givers to be very confident of our results.”

Green light for ‘The Spot’

University researchers awarded Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation grant

Funding boost for University of Melbourne–led ARC Centres of Excellence

Two University of Melbourne–led Centres of Excellence have been awarded $17 million by the Australian Research Council to continue their groundbreaking work.

Based at the University of Melbourne, the ARC Centre of Excellence for Free Radical

Chemistry and Biotechnology and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coherent X-ray Science have received additional funding in recognition of their achievements, and to allow them to continue their research for the next three years.

“Australia has been a world leader in free radical chemistry research,” said Professor Carl Schiesser, Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Free Radical Chemistry and Biotechnology, which received $9.8 million for

the next three-and-a-half years.

“This additional funding will allow us to continue to push the frontiers of free radical chemistry, with significant impact on good health and disease prevention, materials science and environmental best practice.”

More than 140 researchers from five institutions across Australia are part of the Centre, which was established in 2005 following a $12 million grant from the ARC.

The Monash University–led ARC Centre of Excellence in Design in Light Metals and the University of Tasmania–led ARC Centre of Excellence in Ore Deposits, in both of which the University of Melbourne is a partner, also received more than $17 million in extra funding.

33

Former Dean of Science Professor Liz Sonenberg will join Melbourne Research part-time in the role of Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research Collaboration) and will have oversight of development of the University Research Institutes and implementation of a strategy to manage research infrastructure.

Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Peter Rathjen says that Professor Sonenberg is an “outstanding research leader” with a strong background in facilitating and engaging in collaborative research, including personal research engagement with colleagues in Psychology, Computer Science,

Education and Medicine, and with colleagues in The Netherlands for over a decade.

She has also developed collaborative research links with industry partners, including the Australian Artificial Intelligence Institute, Agent Oriented Software, Clarinox, the Defence Science and Technology Organisation, Neuragenix, Hewlett Packard and Microsoft

The University maintains 59 University research centres and 46 centres in collaboration with other groups. There are also 12 co-operative research centres across the faculties.

Melbourne scientists awarded International Science Links grants

Six University of Melbourne scientists have been awarded grants totalling $47,000 to undertake important international collaborative research under the International Science Linkages – Science Academies Program, funded by the Australian Government.

The grant funding is part of $3.9 million provided to the Australian Academy of Science (AAS) by the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and

Research over five years for the International Science Linkages – Science Academies Program.

The program supports collaboration by Australian scientists with international partners on science and technology projects in order to contribute to Australia’s economic, social and environmental wellbeing.

The Melbourne recipients are:

> Associate Professor Muthupandian Ashokkumar, School of Chemistry: Sonochemically synthesised composite nanomaterials

as catalysts in fuel cells

> Dr Todd Lane, Senior Lecturer in Meteorology, School of Earth Sciences: Improved analysis and forecasting of precipitation through assimilation of Doppler radar observations with an ensemble Kalman filter

> Professor Paul Mulvaney, Federation Fellow, School of Chemistry and Bio21 Institute and a co-director of the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Nanoscience and Technology: Plasmonic superstructures – light coupling and sensing

> Dr Frances Separovic, Deputy Head, School of Chemistry: Synchrotron radiation circular dichroism studies of antimicrobial peptides

> Dr Elaine Wong, Senior Lecturer, School of Engineering: Compact VCSEL base-stations for optical-wireless integrated networks

> Associate Professor and Reader Paul Taylor, Melbourne School of Land and Environment: Molecular mechanisms of chickpea defence to pathogens.

See: www.science.org.au/internat

Professor James McCluskey joined Melbourne Research on 3 August in the role of Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research Partnerships) with responsibility for fostering the relationships with affiliated medical research institutes and other external research partners.

Professor McCluskey is Professor of Microbiology and Immunology and Associate Dean Research, Faculty of Medicine Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Melbourne.

He has been a consultant immunologist to the National Transplantation Services, Australian Red Cross Blood Service for the last 17 years, and is the Editor-in-Chief of the international immunogenetics journal, Tissue Antigens.

He will maintain his role as Professor and Deputy Head, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, and will also hold an appointment on the Faculty Executive within the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences.

Liz Sonenberg named Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research Collaboration)

Jim McCluskey named Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research Partnerships)

African-Australian community leader Dr Berhan Ahmed, a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Forest Ecosystem Science at the University of Melbourne’s School of Land and Environment, has been named the Victoria Australian of the Year 2009.

Dr Ahmed is chairman of the African Think Tank, an

organisation whose mission is ‘to act as the voice of refugee communities, mainly the African Australians in Victoria’. Dr Ahmed came to Australia as a refugee in 1987. He spoke little English at the time. He has since completed his PhD in forest industries and has been instrumental in building bridges between the African and the wider Australian communities in Victoria.

Melbourne School of Land and Environment academic wins Victorian of the Year


34

Vision

To be one of the finest universities in the world.

History

The University of Melbourne has been a centre of learning since 1855. The main Parkville campus on the edge of Melbourne’s CBD is a focus of the City’s ‘Knowledge Precinct’ and the prestigious medical research ‘Parkville Strip’.

Melbourne is a leading research university, widely renowned for its teaching, research achievements and social and economic contributions. The University’s performance in international rankings puts it at the forefront of higher education in the Asia-Pacific and beyond.

Times Higher Education, World University Rankings, 2008

> No. 38 in the world > No. 7 in the Asia-Pacific region > The only Australian university to rank in the top 30 in the world in all five of the THE discipline rankings

> Leading Australian university in life sciences and biomedicine

> No. 9 in the world and the leading Australian university as ranked by employers

> No. 21 in the world by international peer review

Academic Ranking of World Universities, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 2008

> No. 6 in the Asia-Pacific region > No. 1 in Australia for scientific papers published

Locations

Main campus: Parkville. Other campuses: The VCA and Music campus at Southbank, Bio21 Institute, Hawthorn, Burnley, Dookie, Werribee, Creswick, Shepparton.

Research and Research Training

> Melbourne is regularly ranked first or second on national research indicators of total research income, research publications, RHD student load and completions. For 2008, Melbourne is first for research income and research publications (2008 RHD student load and completions were unavailable at time of going to press). These indicators are used by the Government to allocate research block funding, with the University receiving the highest allocation nationally.

> Melbourne was ranked first nationally for Australian Competitive Grants.

> Melbourne secured substantial government funding for major institutes, which will have an impact on national and international research capacity…

including:

- the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity

- a $100 million joint initiative with the University to develop one of the most powerful supercomputers in the world and a leading computational biology facility dedicated to life sciences research

- the Grattan Institute, an independent non-aligned national public policy institute affiliated with and based at the University.

> Melbourne has the largest cohort of research students in Australia with an RHD load of over 3000.

> The University has a rich history of pioneering research and technological development, remaining on the forefront of innovation: from…

From the Bionic Ear in the 1970s, bringing hearing to profoundly deaf children and adults…

> To today’s advances in the bionic eye, which will provide unprecedented high-resolution images to thousands with severely impaired vision (see page 6).

From HIV vaccine research that attracted $4 million in funding from the US National Institutes of Health…

> To the vaccine set to eradicate a fatal brain parasite, attracting $15.7 million in funding from the British Government and the Gates Foundation…

And the massive 96-million pixel OptiPortal, a powerful next-generation visualisation wall, the largest of its kind in Australia.

The University AT A GLANCE

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Two-year Statistics

Category 2007 2008

Median ENTER 94.7 93.9

Student Enrolments (EFTSL)

Total Load (EFTSL) 34,677 35,533

Research Higher Degree 3,141 3,213

Postgraduate Coursework 5,947 6,742

Undergraduate 25,589 25,578

% Female Enrolment 55.8% 55.6%

International Load (EFTSL) 9,385 9,899

% International 27.1% 27.9%

Award Completions

Research Higher Degree (excl Higher Doct) 729 718 (est)

PG Coursework 4,396 4,478 (est)

Undergraduate 7,953 7,994 (est)

Total 13,078 13,190 (est)

Staff (FTE) (March, including casuals and excluding TAFE)

Academic (All) 3,250 3,328

Professionals (All) 3,804 3,942

Total 7,054 7,270

Student:Staff Ratio (August)

T&R Faculty Staff 17.7 18.1

All Academic Faculty Staff 10.8 10.8

Research Expenditure ($ million) 562 (est) $653.7

Research Performance Indicators

Research Income ($ million) 309.0 (2) 382.5 (1)

Research Publications 3,909 (2) 4,317 weighted (1)

Research Load (EFTSL) 3,141 3,213

Research Completions (eligible)* 729 718 (est)

Numbers in brackets are Melbourne’s national rank, based on the proportion of the national total for each category.

* Eligible completions means those included in RTS formula; excludes Higher Doctorates by publication.

University Facts and Figures

GRADUATES IN FULL-TIME EMPLOYMENT %

University of Melbourne

Other Victorian Institutions (average)

Other Australian Institutions (average)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

20082007200620052004

0

4,000

8,000

12,000

16,000

20,000

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32,000

36,000

20082007200620052004

Total Load (EFTSL)

Researcher Higher Degree

Postgraduate Coursework

Undergraduate

STUDENT ENROLMENTS BY COURSE LEVELS


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Repairs and Maintenance 3.4%

Scholarships, Grants and Prizes 3.9%

Employee Related Expenses 50.2%

Other Expenses 36.8%

Depreciation and Amortisation 5.7%

HECS-HELP (Govt and Student Payments) 7.6%FEE-HELP 2.2%

Australian Government Recurrent Financial Assistance* 22.4%

State Government Financial Assistance 3.3%Investments, Fees and Charges and Other Income 38.3%

Other Australian Government Financial Assistance 21.8%

Grants, Donations and Bequests 4.4%

SOURCES OF INCOME

EXPENDITURES

* Australian Government Recurrent Financial Assistance includes funding for the Commonwealth Grants Scheme, Institutional Grants Scheme, Research Training Scheme and Research Infrastructure Block Grants.

RESEARCH INCOME ($Million)

200820072006200520040

40

80

120

160

200

240

280

320

360

400

RESEARCH EXPENDITURE ($Million)

Note: As formal analysis is undertaken biennially for the Australian Bureau of Statistics data collection, results for odd years are estimates.

20082007200620052004

0

60

120180

240300360420480540600660

SOURCES OF INCOME %

Australian GovernmentRecurrent Financial

Assistance

Grants, Donationsand Bequests

Investments, Fees andCharges and Other Incomes

State GovernmentFinancial Assistance

HECS HELPOther AustralianGovernment Financial

Assistance

1999

2001

2003

2005

2007

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

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As one of the nation’s leading research training institutions, we are seeking high calibre students to become partners in our research endeavours. Our generous scholarships program provides research students with essential � nancial support and opportunities for international � eldwork or study travel. Our researchers and facilities are among the world’s � nest and graduate students can contribute to projects at the forefront of international research.

Melbourne’s strong international reputation and networks open doors for graduates seeking research and career opportunities at leading universities and organisations around the globe. At the University of Melbourne, you will become part of a dynamic research community, working alongside the best and brightest researchers and students.

To � nd out more about undertaking a graduate research degree at Melbourne, visit www.futurestudents.unimelb.edu.au/research

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Research Training. Join Australia’s Best.

Documents

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