Young Tall Poppies of the Year 2019

Australia is the driest inhabited continent on Earth yet has been home to thousands of generations. Traditional knowledge of finding and re-finding water sites has always been integral to Australia’s First Peoples for survival in an arid landscape and protecting water remains a cultural obligation.He explores historical challenges and institutional responses in integrating First Peoples’ cultural values into water planning and management, coupled with on-the-ground applications of cultural value water for two Western NSW Rivers. He has also investigated how First People’s perspectives were integrated into water management in New Zealand.

Bradley’s extensive public outreach has included many public lectures and participation in activities for groups spanning for school children, government,including Ministers, industry, and members of the Academy. He is a passionate about his advocacy for promoting cultural awareness and science in water management policy, and has also been the narrator for BBC and ABC documentaries. Mr Moggridge is currently a PhD Candidate and IAE Advisor at the University of Canberra.

• Indigenous Knowledge
• Cultural Values of Water

The internet provides many benefits but when it comes to gambling and gaming, the constant accessibility, ability to spend money quickly, and ongoing play has resulted in some people developing serious problems. Associate Professor Gainsbury investigates the psychology of addictive gambling and gaming, with a focus on the development of harm-minimisation strategies for vulnerable players, including young people. Her research includes approaches from psychology, health sciences, public health, and economics to investigate how gambling and gaming have been transformed by emerging technologies.

Sally’s community involvement has spanned many media interviews,including the internationally broadcast Jim Jeffries Show, and she has worked extensively with policy makers in Australia and abroad to influence industry standards and improve consumer protections. Her policy recommendations have been incorporated into legislation.

Associate Professor Gainsbury received her PhD from the University of Sydney in2010, and is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Sydney.

• Psychology

On the Great Barrier Reef and worldwide, Dr Rummer is tracking athletic capacity in fish, including sharks and rays, under different conditions, across development and species, and over generations to determine how climate change and other stressors will affect the future of marine ecosystems. She also has a strong interest in exercise-induced stress (e.g., swimming, vertical movements, buoyancy control) and, from a more applied angle, catch-and-release fishing, including post-release mortality and sub-lethal physiological/behavioural modifications.

In the field, geographic gradients are used (e.g., temperature gradients along the length of the Great Barrier Reef) and local extreme environments (e.g., low oxygen, high CO² microhabitats within a mangrove or coral reef and even underwater volcanic CO² seeps) as analogues for future change. In the laboratory, her research integrates conventional and state-of-the-art physiological, biochemical, and molecular techniques to gain insight into the various responses that may be key to adaptation.

These areas are not only vital to conservation of coral reef and marine ecosystems but are also important contributions to basic

• Marine Ecology and evolutionary physiology

Despite the overwhelming majority of Earth’s volcanism occurring underwater, we know very little about deep sea volcanic eruptions. Dr Carey leads international multidisciplinary research teams who study these volcanoes using underwater robots to investigate eruption deposits. She is currently working with ecosystem modellers to predict the recovery of biological communities devastated by submarine volcanic eruptions.

Rebecca’s enthusiasm for science communication is shown in her work informing disaster management policy and practice, and international policy development on the impacts of deep sea mining. She has also had many television, newspaper, and radio media interviews, and has visited numerous primary schools.

Dr Carey completed her PhD at the University of Hawai’i in 2008, and is currently a Senior Lecturer at the University of Tasmania.

• Earth Sciences

The Earth is just one planet in our diverse cosmic backyard, and other planetary environments can be wildly different. Studying the clusters of craters in Mars’ crust resulting from collisions and impact events can help us understand Mars’ interior structure, which may lead to developing a unified theory of how rocky planets form. Dr Miljkovic explores our geologic origins by studying the geophysics of planets and moons through craters on the surface of Earth, the moon, asteroids and Mars. She also uses numerical modelling to simulate impact events throughout the Solar system.

Her team will have access to data collected from a seismometer placed on the Mars surface by NASA’s InSight mission, with the aim to understand the planet’s interior structure.

Katarina’s extensive public outreach includes numerous engagements with high school students, wide ranging media interviews and contributions to The Conversation, and events with the Australian Space Agency.

Dr Miljkovic received her PhD from the Open University United Kingdom in 2010, and is currently ARC DECRA Fellow at Curtin University

• Planetary and Space Science

Schizophrenia is associated with numerous cognitive defects closely linked to many poor functional outcomes. Many of these debilitating symptoms, including impaired memory and inability to concentrate, currently have no effective treatments. Dr Rogasch’s research combines non-invasive brain stimulation and neuroimaging methods to uncover differences in prefrontal mechanisms between people with healthy cognitive function and those with schizophrenia, and looks at identifying how best to alter these mechanisms. This research has the potential inform potential new treatments for improving cognitive function across a vast range of brain disorders.

Nigel’s enthusiastic science communication spans national television programs, radio and print interviews, and regular public lectures and school visits. He also established a work experience program that brings school students into the lab, and developed a science club with primary school students.

Dr Rogasch received his PhD from Monash University in 2014, and is currently a senior research fellow at The University of Adelaide, South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, and Monash University

• Neuroscience