ANSTO has submitted three nominations for the 2011 Australian Museum Eureka Prizes and is looking forward to Friday 12 August, when the finalists will be announced.
One of our nominees is ANSTO Bragg Institute scientist, Dr Vanessa Peterson. Vanessa’s work covers one of the biggest challenges facing the world today – developing alternative and sustainable clean energy technologies.
Vanessa leads Australia’s Neutrons for the Hydrogen Economy project, known as the Energy Project, which focuses on progressing new energy technologies using ANSTO’s expertise in collaboration with researchers from across the world.
Through the Energy Project, Vanessa directs original research into the discovery and development of materials that will improve the performance of sustainable clean energy devices.
By applying her expertise in neutron scattering in combination with her knowledge of the materials themselves, she is able to gain an understanding of the atomic and molecular scale functionality of these materials, a crucial step in their improvement.
Neutron-scattering tools are extremely well suited for the study of new-energy systems and excel particularly in the study of hydrogen in materials and conductor materials (as used in fuel cells and batteries).
This project is looking at energy systems that use hydrogen ( i.e. hydrogen production, storage, and use in fuel-cells), solar-energy materials, and the study of energy-transport mechanisms in battery and ion-conductive materials. Find out more about the Neutrons for the Hydrogen Economy Project.
As a young scientist, Dr. Peterson has achieved results and recognition well beyond her years, including a prolific record of publications and the responsibility of leading the international Energy Project, which under her leadership has grown to international significance and has three postdoctoral researchers.
ANSTO has submitted a nomination for Vanessa in the ‘Outstanding Young Researcher’ category.
Our other nominees were ANSTO LifeScience’s Ivan Greguric and the Cooperative Research Centre's team, nominated in the ‘Medical Research Translation’ category, and Materials Engineering's Greg Lumpkin and team who ANSTO nominated in the ‘Research by an Interdisciplinary Team’ category.
ANSTO wishes all of our nominees the best of luck.
Published: 23/05/2011