Macquarie University’s Australian Astronomical Optics (AAO) has signed an agreement with pioneering manufacturer Gilmour Space to produce a new piece of space technology, set to launch in 2023.

Gilmour Space is one of Australia’s pioneer NewSpace companies and the leading venture-backed manufacturer of launch vehicles and satellite platforms.

AAO Macquarie is world renowned for its ground-based precision instrumentation for telescopes and is now branching out to non-astronomy applications in space. As part of this new partnership with Gilmour Space, a team of technical specialists from AAO Macquarie will construct and deliver a novel thermal camera payload device.

“The payload will be attached to a satellite which is set to orbit around the Earth in late 2023,” says Dr Lee Spitler from AAO Macquarie. “The data collected from the thermal camera payload will be unique and allow the exploration of a new approach to collecting imaging data.

“The agreement marks an exciting new chapter for AAO Macquarie, as our team of experts can expand their skills and remits to support the growing interest in space exploration.”

This is a unique mission involving only Australian parties and kick-starts Macquarie’s participation in the NewSpace era of agile space technology development.

AAO Macquarie has several other innovative space-related projects currently underway with Australian industry and defence organisations. This includes a partnership with a Sydney-based company to design custom optical components that will land on the moon in 2025.

 Learn more about AAO Macquarie’s work.

Every month we celebrate impressive achievements and partnerships within the Macquarie community. Got something to share for next month? Tell us.

Macquarie’s star scientist

Congratulations to Dr Tayyaba Zafar, who has been named among the 2020 NSW Young Tall Poppies by the Australian Institute of Policy and Science.

Tayyaba is an astrophysicist and lecturer at Australian Astronomical Optics (AAO) at Macquarie University, with her work focused on what stardust can tell us about the universe.

A strong advocate for encouraging women into STEM, read about Tayabba’s work inspiring the next generation of female scientists.

One overall winner in each state will be announced at the national Tall Poppy Awards later this month.

Historian’s ‘master work’ wins Premier’s prize

Kate Fullagar, an Honorary Professor in the Department of Modern History, Politics and International Relations, has won the General History Prize at the 2020 NSW Premier’s History Awards for her book The Warrior, the Voyager, and the Artist.

By charting the unlikely story of the intersecting lives of three 18th-century­ figures – Cherokee warrior Ostenaco, Raiatean voyager Mai and the British artist who painted them both, Joshua Reynolds – the book challenges our understanding of Indigenous peoples’ interactions with the globalising force of the British Empire.

Yay for our BA

Macquarie’s reimagined Bachelor of Arts – launched this year – has been shortlisted in the Australian Financial Review’s Higher Education Awards in the Employability category.

Designed in consultation with industry partners, the Faculty of Arts created the new degree to equip students with the most in-demand transferable skills like communication, problem solving and critical thinking to prepare them for employment. Throughout the course, students build a digital portfolio to showcase their skills to future employers while learning how humanities subjects can be applied to tackle problems in the world of work.

The AFR Higher Education Award winners will be announced on 18 November.

New grant to support wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people

A team from the Department of Indigenous Studies, made up of Professor Bronwyn Carlson, Madi Day, Dr Tristan Kennedy and Dr Ryan Frazer, has been awarded a $950,000 grant by the Commonwealth Department of Health for a project in partnership with ReachOut Australia.

The project aims to address the social and emotional wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people through an innovative and culturally safe social media campaign and supporting online resources.

Centre for Emotional Health research project awarded $700,000

Bupa Health Foundation has committed approximately $700,000 to a research project aimed at developing a sustainable system to deliver early intervention for mental health through Australian schools.

Working with students, parents, educators and policy-makers, ARC Australian Laureate Fellow and Distinguished Professor Ron Rapee will lead the project with the aim to develop and test the best possible method to identify youth at risk and test effective pathways to appropriate care.

“Young people with mental health problems rarely reach out for the help that they need. With this support from the Bupa Foundation, we’ll be able to develop innovative methods to identify young people who are in distress and connect them with the most appropriate places to get help,” says Ron.

Macquarie’s course #1 in Australia

In April, Austrade partnered with the social learning platform FutureLearn and Universities across Australia to provide free online courses to help students around the world continue learning during COVID lockdowns and to promote Australia as a quality study destination.

Twenty Higher Education and English Language Training providers released a collection of 52 free short courses onto the FutureLearn site. With over 836,000 enrolments, the campaign has been well received globally.

MUIC-ELC’s ‘Improve your IELTS Speaking Score’ has rated the most popular among these offerings, with 75,000 enrolments, in excess of 35,000 active participants, 7,300 completions and a rating of 4.9 out of 5 for satisfaction.

Director of MUIC and ELC Dr Pamela Humphreys led development and content planning for the course. She says it’s immensely gratifying to see how the course has resonated with international students,.

“We’re so proud that it was number one in the Austrade campaign based on enrolments. The team did an exceptional job putting it together, and it really is a wonderful testament to the quality of teaching we provide at MUIC-ELC.”

All 2448 optical fibre spines are now installed in their final configuration, allowing the AESOP instrument to simultaneously position all of them to an accuracy of 10 micrometres (10 one millionths of a metre) in one minute. Once all the fibres are on-target, they will feed the light they collect from each star or galaxy to three spectrographs for analysis.

Watch the AESOP in action:

Almost everyone in the AESOP team of 24 people was involved in assembling and testing the 28 spine modules.

“This is an outstanding result, and a credit to the entire team,” says AESOP Project Manager Scott Smedley. “We’re looking forward to the next phase, and even more to seeing it in place and scanning the southern sky.”

AESOP forms a key part of the 4MOST instrument, a multi-national collaboration in which more than 300 scientists and engineers are building a multi-fibre feed instrument for the European Southern Observatory’s VISTA telescope in Chile’s Atacama Desert.

This is planned to be the largest spectroscopic survey facility of its kind in the southern hemisphere, exploring the most pressing questions in the fields of galactic archaeology, high-energy astrophysics, galaxy evolution and cosmology.

Katrina Sealey and Tayabba Zafar are women reaching for the stars, in more ways than one. Both accomplished scientists within Macquarie-AAO, they recently returned from a three-week trip to Antarctica as part of Homeward Bound, a 10-year project building a 1000-strong network of female leaders in STEM. We sat down with them to find out more about this incredible project.

As young girls, did you think a successful career in STEM was within your reach?

Tayyaba: “No. I grew up in Pakistan, and astronomy – the subject was most fascinated with – wasn’t taught there. So I chose to study physics and built my astronomy knowledge through books and online materials. Cultural norms in Pakistan meant I didn’t have the same freedoms to pursue my profession ­– I had to pave my own way with hard work and optimism.”

Katrina: “I didn’t frame the question to myself in that way ­– I just knew that I loved science and that I wanted to follow my passion and see where it would take me. Like many women, I was told by school career advisors that my options were nursing or admin. I did not listen and pursued my passion.”

What is the biggest challenge of being a woman working in STEM?

Katrina: “Being alone or feeling alone. But I can see positive changes in this area, particularly at Macquarie. After more than six years as the only women on an executive team, I am now not alone. It’s important to have diversity – I believe this leads to the best outcomes.”

Tayyaba: “Gender and territorial biases. I have always been judged on my gender and ethnic origin, not because of my science.”

One of the goals of Macquarie’s gender equity strategy is to increase the representation of women in senior academic positions, and in STEMM generally. What do you think is the best way of doing this?

Katrina: “Starting with recruitment processes, ensuring they are inclusive and that women are represented in all aspects of the recruitment from applicants to panellists. Then, after recruitment, there needs to be flexible work environments and leadership support.”

Tayyaba: “We need mentorship and coaching ­– not only while girls are young to lead them to science, but also to keep them in science during the life phases where so many quit their loved profession.

“The other key is flexibility where it’s required. Women need flexibility and support, especially when they are pregnant, breastfeeding, or tending to their families. If you support them when they are in these ‘valley phases’, you’ll help them reach the peak again. And trust me, they are capable of doing it.”

So what’s the Homeward Bound Project all about?

Katrina: “Homeward Bound is a leadership initiative for women in STEM, increasing the leadership and skills of women and providing a strong network to assist with the global underrepresentation of women in leadership positions.”

Tayyaba: “It trains women to not only be the face – and voice – of their fields, but also to talk about the issues challenging mankind, such as climate change. The overall goal is to build future women leaders and change the shape of the planet.”

And why Antarctica?

Tayyaba: “Antarctica was chosen as to let us see the effect of climate change first-hand. And there’s no better place to wake up your inner leader than the pure white continent that is Antarctica.”

Katrina: “Being in a remote environment, away from the disturbances of our busy lives, gave us the opportunity to focus on what we believe is important and reflect on how we can make impact for our collective futures – whether that’s increasing diversity in our workplaces or developing sustainability strategies.”

What knowledge are you bringing back to Macquarie after your year with Homeward Bound?

Katrina: “A key part of the program was the importance of being visible. It’s easy to get caught up in day-to-day work. But to help others and make change we need to be visible, and provide input into outcomes and innovation.”

You’ll soon be heading out on schools outreach, using some of the new skills you’ve gained from Homeward Bound. What do you hope to communicate to the students you speak to?

Katrina: “That they are enough and that they can do anything. They just need to decide what they want to do and then take action to accomplish it. Support and help is all around, they just need to ask.”

Tayyaba: “I will be encouraging girls to be choosing science; telling them why we need more women and how, with their talent, they can illuminate the world.”

I’ve been at Macquarie for…
Three months.

In a nutshell, my job is to…
Work on building instruments used for telescopes and perform research on the interstellar medium to study gas, metals and dust in galaxies.

The question I get asked most is…
“How is interstellar dust formed?”

(Find out the answer in The Lighthouse.)

The top three things on my to-do list today are…
1) Finish a grant proposal for the Ultimate-Subaru telescope project.
2) Work on an ARC Future fellowship application.
3) Write an observing proposal for the European Southern Observatory telescopes.

Name a Macquarie staff member that impressed you last week…
Dr Katrina Sealey [AAO’s Head of Research Data and Software] for supporting women in STEM.

Where are you from?
I was born in Pakistan and did my Masters in Physics there. I did my PhD in Astrophysics in Denmark, a postdoc in France and a fellowship in Germany with the European Southern Observatory. Almost three years ago I moved to Australia to work with the AAO, which recently become part of Macquarie.

The most amazing place I’ve ever visited is…
The European Southern Observatory, a series of Very Large Telescopes in the Atacama Desert in Chile.

I’m really looking forward to…
A trip to Antarctica as part of Homeward Bound 2019, a year-long project to develop leadership and strategic capabilities in women in science.