Dr Lou Vance and Melody Carter of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) Materials and Engineering Science division have received awards at the annual meeting of the American Ceramic Society in Nashville, Tennessee.
At this major gathering of over 2000 international ceramic scientists and engineers they presented a paper on their latest radioactive wasteform research to the Ceramics for Environmental Remediation Symposium.
Lou Vance was inducted as a Fellow of the American Ceramic Society, recognising a lifetime of outstanding contribution to the field of science, particularly with radioactive wasteform ceramics. He was made a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Physics in 1987.
After finishing his Ph.D in Physics at Monash University in 1968, Dr Vance joined the forerunner of ANSTO, the Australian Atomic Energy Commission. In 1969 he went overseas, working on various projects in England, the USA and Canada. He returned to Australia and ANSTO in 1987 and is now a Chief Research Scientist.
Since 1991 Dr Vance has been Technical Manager of the Synroc Project which is an important part of radioactive wasteform research and development.
Melody Carter won her award for the best paper (co-authored by Lou Vance, Darren Attard and Dave Mitchell), "Effects of sub-surface damage induced by mechanical polishing on leach testing of caesium-bearing hollandite", which she presented last year.
"The paper looked at the effect of surface preparation of ceramic samples, designed to incorporate radioactive waste, on their subsequent behaviour in hot water. This was to confirm their long term (tens of thousands of years) durability," she said.
" While the experiment did not show much difference in resulting durability, it generated a lot of interest and provided other scientists with food for thought."
The prizewinners received plaques to mark their achievements.