UQ researchers receive ARC funding boost

University of Queensland researchers have been awarded more than $10 million from the Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowships scheme.

The 11 UQ recipients are among 100 mid-career researchers from across the country who will share in more than $97 million to progress innovative research.

The fellowships will support a diverse range of UQ projects, from exploring how volcanoes can help produce metals of the future, to better controlling mosquito-borne diseases.

UQ ARC Future Fellowship recipients:

• Dr Mahsa Baktashmotlagh - improving artificial intelligence (AI) modelling to better support decision making in high-risk industries.
• Dr Michael Bermingham - improving the functionality of 3D-printed metals to increase the productivity of Australian manufacturers and lower the cost of products.
• Professor Clint Bracknell - designing and implementing a program of Noongar language and song revitalisation in the south of Western Australia to explore how Indigenous creative responses can spur action on global challenges.
• Dr Zeinab Khalil - future design of more effective antibiotics and defining new microbial defence molecules to meet demands in agrochemical and environmental sciences.
• Associate Professor Andrew Phillips - examining Asia’s historical geopolitics to improve Australia’s historical understanding of the power contests that have made modern Asia and enhance policy decision making.
• Dr Martin Plöschner - creating a suite of tools to guide the development of next-generation lasers which could benefit industries from telecommunications to precision manufacturing.
• Dr Jonathan Redshaw - research into how children and primates think about alternative possibilities to develop a framework that may help people better reason about possibilities and bring them to fruition.
• Dr Andrii Slonchak - exploring how certain insect-only viruses make mosquitoes incapable of transmitting diseases and how they could be used as biocontrol agents for mosquito-borne human and veterinary diseases.
• Dr Teresa Ubide - researching the inner workings of volcanoes to help target their copper deposits, which are critical for renewable energy.
• Dr Zhiliang Wang - developing approaches for catalytic materials design, materials for efficient solar fuel production and cutting-edge knowledge on methane activation mechanism, supporting Australia’s Net-Zero Emission 2050 target.
• Associate Professor Steven Zuryn - researching how bacteria that reside in an animal’s gut influence its mitochondria – the powerhouses of cell.

Media: UQ Communications, communications@uq.edu.au, +61 (0)429 056 139.