As this decade draws to a close, the staff at AINSE would like to take this opportunity to reflect upon another successful year for our AINSE scholars and their supervisors, and to celebrate AINSE’s accomplishments in our 61st year of operation.
In 2019, AINSE were proud to support new and continuing students from our 45 university and industry members across Australia and New Zealand through the provision of:
- 30 new Honours scholarships;
- Over 80 top-up scholarships for PhD students, including 12 residential scholarships; and
- 7 research internship scholarships that, in partnership with ANSTO and the Embassy of France in Australia, supported postdoctoral and Early Career Researchers in travelling between Australia and France to further their research projects.
AINSE further expanded support its support for Early Career Researchers in 2019 by launching our new Early Career Researcher Grant (ECRG). This first round of the ECRG saw 11 Early Career Researchers each awarded a grant of A$10,000 to cover consumable expenses, carer requirements, and research-related travel and accommodation. It is hoped that these ECRGs will provide Early Career Researchers working at ANSTO with the means to access additional opportunities in the initial stages of their research careers.
Over 20 AINSE international travel scholarships were awarded in 2019. These scholarships provided postgraduate students with the opportunity to present their AINSE-supported research to their research communities worldwide. In addition, AINSE sponsored over a dozen domestic conferences through the provision of travel support that enabled students from AINSE-member universities to access these events.
Throughout the year, more than 100 undergraduate students visited AINSE to attend intensive education schools at ANSTO’s Lucas Heights campus in South Sydney. In July, the 23rd annual AINSE Winter School provided final-year undergraduate students with the opportunity to gain practical experience with ANSTO’s landmark research infrastructure and discuss opportunities to collaborate with ANSTO researchers on postgraduate research projects. Recently, in the first week of December, the 3rd annual AINSE WISE School gave first-year undergraduate Women in STEM the opportunity to gain invaluable career advice from a variety of distinguished researchers and entrepreneurs, as well as kick-starting a year-long mentorship program with AINSE and ANSTO staff that will continue throughout 2020.
Read more about AINSE’s 3rd WISE School here.
During National Science Week 2019, AINSE launched its brand-new website and took the opportunity to promote a small selection of the outstanding research currently being undertaken by our AINSE Scholars. You can read more about our AINSE-supported postgraduate research projects below:
- Student Research Spotlight: Melanie Fuller
- Student Research Spotlight: Thomas McCoy
- Student Research Spotlight: Kaitlyn O’Mara
- Student Research Spotlight: Mitchell Klenner
2019 was also a year of great accomplishments for many former AINSE scholars. To name just a few of these accomplishments:
- Dr. Lydia Mackenzie (former AINSE PGRA Scholar) was formally presented with the AINSE Postgraduate Gold Medal for her research into palaeoenvironmental change and human land-use during the Holocene;
- Prof. Vanessa Peterson (former AINSE PGRA Scholar) received the ANBUG Neutron Award for her outstanding research in neutron science and leadership in promoting the neutron science community;
- Dr. Neeraj Sharma (former AINSE Research Fellow) was awarded the NSW Early Career Researcher of the Year (Physical Sciences) in the NSW Premier’s Prizes for Science and Engineering; and
- Prof. Anna Paradowska (former AINSE PGRA Scholar) was appointed as a Conjoint Professor of Practice in Advanced Structural Materials at the University of Sydney.
We wish to congratulate Dr. Mackenzie, Prof. Peterson, Dr. Sharma, Prof. Paradowska, and all our past AINSE scholars for their outstanding achievements.
Finally, the AINSE staff would like to wish all our scholars, supervisors and supporters a safe and happy holiday season. We’re looking forward to another great year ahead in 2020, and we can’t wait to see what our scholars will accomplish next in the decade to come.
Don’t forget that applications are now open for AINSE Honours scholarships in 2020, and we are currently receiving expressions of interest for our next Particle Therapy in Japan study tour, which will take place in August 2020.
For more information on AINSE programs in 2020, please visit our Scholarships and Award page, follow our social media accounts on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, and sign up for our mailing list.