Operations

Scientist available for interview, Tuesday 17 June 2014

Lighter-weight, fuel-efficient cars may be closer to reality thanks to Geelong researchers who are giving carbon fibre the gripping power it needs to be able to stand up to impacts from motorists.

High-performance vehicles already use carbon fibre – a high-strength lightweight material that can be moulded into complex shapes – to make cars lighter, more fuel-efficient and faster.

But although strong, carbon fibre is prone to damage from sudden impact. And unlike metal, it can’t be repaired – only replaced.

This factor has limited the material’s uptake by the wider automotive industry, as the common bingle would end up costing motorists a lot more to fix.

Ms Linden Servinis, a PhD student at Deakin University, and her colleagues have developed a treatment for carbon fibre that makes it 16% stronger by forming extra chemical ‘arms’ that grip onto its surroundings, allowing the material to withstand greater impacts. [Read more…] about Cars can be lighter, faster, stronger – but they need more arms

But researchers have to teach yeast to make it

Thursday 5 June 2014

Queensland researchers are persuading baker’s yeast to produce orange-flavoured renewable jet fuel from sugar.

Mr Timothy Brennan and his colleagues at the University of Queensland’s Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology have helped genetically-engineered yeast to evolve to make an oil called limonene, which is found naturally in lemons and oranges, and also happens to be an efficient jet fuel.

They’ve worked out how to get the yeast to make more oil without killing itself in the process.

It’s an important step in scaling up biofuel production so that it can become a serious alternative to traditional fossil fuels. [Read more…] about Future fuels will come in orange flavour

Tuesday 3 June 2014

Scientist available for interview in Perth on Tuesday 3 June

Dr Francis Torres, a physicist at the University of Western Australia, has developed the mirror device at the heart of a new amplifier technology, which uses an interaction between a high-powered laser and mirror motion to magnify subtle metal, temperature and biological vibrations so they are more easily detected.

“Our idea is to connect the sensors in existing space exploration tools to our amplifier so they can look deeper underground and find smaller and hard-to-find targets such as hidden mineral deposits, water or other bacterial life,” says Francis, who developed the resonator mirror as part of his PhD.

According to Francis, the amplifier technology could also enhance the detection sensitivity of Earth exploration tools and medical sensors.

[Read more…] about A ‘tango’ between light and mirrors could help find signs of life on Mars, and identify minerals and water deposits here on Earth

5am AEST, 28 May 2014

Vision: laboratories, close-up photos of the worms, footage of Michael’s talk

Cairns researchers have discovered a wound-healing and cancer-causing hormone in the spit of a liver worm that lives in over nine million people and infects adventurous Australian tourists. The Southeast Asian liver fluke munches through the liver repairing the damage as it goes. But after many years of infection it can cause liver cancer and kills 20,000 people each year in Thailand alone.

Now James Cook University researcher Dr Michael Smout has found that a protein in the spit also sends wound-healing messages.

In 2010 James Cook University researchers discovered that the worm spit was promoting cell growth and wound repair. Then in 2012 Dr Michael Smout discovered a growth hormone in the spit, showed it was responsible both for the repair and in part for the cancer, and that it promotes wound-healing. He hopes that the work will lead both to new wound-healing compounds, and to a vaccine against the worm.

The discovery received no public attention at the time. But now its discoverer, Dr Michael Smout, is presenting the work publically for the first time thanks to FameLab Australia. He won the Australian final two weeks ago in Perth using a teddy bear to assist in his talk. He flies to the International FameLab final in the UK on Friday to represent Australia. [Read more…] about Worm spit heals then kills; sends Cairns scientist to the UK in search of fame