Capability Improvement Award – Winner: Sustainment of Emergent Materials team
This collaborative team (working under the auspices of DMTC Project Team 5.77) has worked extensively on the development of laser additive deposition (LAD) technology for the past 10 years and has achieved significant outcomes for commercial and Defence customers.
Smiles all-round for members of the team awarded the DMTC Capability Improvement Award for 2020
For defence customers, innovative approaches to, and adoption of new technologies for, sustainment of fleets is crucial, especially in light of the cost pressures associated with life cycle support on military platforms. Through this project and previous enabling research, DMTC has been an integral partner in helping to generate a sovereign industrial capability in Australia in laser repair technology. RUAG Australia has shown repeatedly that repairing components, rather than replacing them, enables Defence to achieve the desired structural performance rates and fleet availability results at a fraction of the cost, and in fractions of the time.
“RUAG Australia continues to be a top performer in innovation in Australia. Working together with DMTC has directly proven that this passionate pursuit of innovation and collaborative research and development ensures solid benefits for all stakeholders,” Neil Matthews, Chief Technical Advisor & Senior Manager Additive Technologies, RUAG Australia said.
This project has not only demonstrated the successful geometrical restoration of actual aircraft components, but also the viability of LAD technology for repair of Defence-grade materials. Researchers from RUAG, Swinburne and RMIT developed and supported the establishment of state-of-the-art sustainment and repair laser cladding facility at RUAG which is now fully operational through the funding of the Defence Capability and Technology Demonstrator (CTD) Program. The work carried out by research partners, RMIT and Swinburne, ensured that the restored Defence components meet certification, operational and design requirements.
Project Leadership Award – Winner: Professor Flavia Huygens
Professor Flavia Huygens received the Project Leadership Award at the 2020 DMTC Annual Conference.
Professor Huygens receiving the Project Leadership Award from CEO DMTC, Dr Mark Hodge (left) and special guest dinner speaker Adam Goodes (right)
Professor Huygens is Associate Director at the Institute of Health Biomedical Innovation (QIMR-Berghofer), a Professor at the School of Biomedical Sciences at Queensland University of Technology and a director of Australian med-tech start-up company, Microbio.
Professor Huygens has shown excellent project leadership over the last year in seamlessly bringing together a multidisciplinary team from academia and industry to develop a rapid diagnostic with her company Microbio, which is helping to address significant issues in the diagnosis of bio-threat pathogens.
She is the pioneer behind the technology of InfectID®, which uses novel and innovative bioinformatic tools to genetically identify blood/plasma borne bacteria. This technology has been shown to distinguish between more than 10 closely related pathogens without the generation of false positives. This type of technology is critical for the military to respond to outbreaks of infection or deliberate biological attacks.
The way Professor Huygens has managed the complexities of working across partners to meet the delivery requirements has been second to none.
More information on this project is in our 2019 Annual Report here.
Early Career Research Award – Winner: Emily Kibble
Miss Emily Kibble was the recipient of the Early Career Award at the 2020 DMTC Annual Conference. She is currently a PhD candidate in molecular biology at Murdoch University.
PhD candidate and Early Career Research Award winner Emily Kibble with CEO DMTC, Dr Mark Hodge
Emily has produced outstanding work over the last few years in her PhD and contributed significantly to the DMTC collaborative project led by the University of Western Australia, along with DST Group, the Peter Doherty Institute, the University of Wurzburg, the University of Exeter, DSTL and now Monash University. This project focuses on the development of novel anti-virulence compounds against a range of bio-warfare pathogens.
Emily’s PhD research examines the pathogen Neisseria meningitidis, which causes meningococcal disease. In particular, it focuses on the inhibition of a protein called Mip, which appears to be key for the bacteria’s development and infectivity. This inhibition could become a target for viable treatments and is highly important as there has been little research into Mip protein function in this particular pathogen.
In addition to this research, Emily has developed a novel screening mechanism to reduce the time required to test anti-virulence inhibitors against pathogens, increasing the efficiency of the testing process.
As well as receiving this award from DMTC, Emily was awarded the Australian Industry and Defence Network (AIDN) Young Achiever of the Year Award in 2018. Her contribution to DMTC has been significant, and she is very deserving of this award.
More detail on Emily’s work is available in this recent blog post.
Writing for the Australian Financial Review, DMTC CEO Dr Mark Hodge discussed the importance of getting the macro, national policy settings right as an enabler of successful innovation and technology development activities in Australia’s defence and national security sectors.
