Instructors
Semester 1, 2012- HET602 Exploring the Solar System: Kurt Liffman Dr Kurt Liffman has a B.Sc.(Hons) in Mathematics from the University of Melbourne and PhD in astrophysics from the Department of Physics and Astronomy, Rice University (Houston, TX). Kurt has worked on problems related to the formation of the Solar System at NASA's Johnson Space Center (Houston, TX) and AMES Research Center (Mountain View, CA). Kurt currently works full time at the CSIRO and part time with SAO. He is also a visiting scientist at the Hawai'i Institute of Geophysics and Planetology.
Around a decade ago, Kurt published a theory suggesting that the some major components in meteorites (and, possibly, the planets) were formed in the early Solar System by bipolar jet flows that existed in the first few million years of the Solar System. This theory has grown in popularity and has obtained some preliminary experimental confirmation. It is now one of the leading theories for understanding the formation of the foundation stones of the planets.
- HET603 Exploring Stars and the Milky Way: Chris Flynn Dr Chris Flynn's research interests are dark matter and the chemical evolution and kinematics of galaxies. He obtained his Ph.D. from Mount Stromlo in Canberra in 1989, and subsequently drifted steadily north, working at the Astronomisches Rechen-Institut in Heidelberg, NORDITA and the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton in the USA and at Tuorla Observatory in Finland, where he works in space based optical astronomy. He is currently spending 6 months at Swinburne where he is Assistant Coordinator for SAO. His research interests right now are "Solar twins" and "Earthshine"
- HET624 Galaxies and their Place in the Universe: Terry Bridges Dr Terry Bridges received his Ph.D. in astrophysics at Queen's University, Kingston, in 1992 and spent the next dozen years or so working as a research astronomer at observatories around the world (Observatoire Midi-Pyrenees in Toulouse, France; Royal Greenwich Observatory in Cambridge, which sadly closed in 1998; and the Anglo-Australian Observatory Sydney, Australia). During this time, he got to observe at lots of nice places, including Hawaii, Australia, Chile, and La Palma.
Terry returned to Canada with his family in late 2003. Since then he has taught undergraduate physics and astronomy courses at Queen's University, obtained a B.Ed., and was coordinator for the Queen's observatory. In 2008 Terry returned to Australia, spending 6 months at the AAO working in the Australian Gemini Office. Terry's astronomical research interests are centered around stellar populations in nearby galaxies, in particular using globular clusters to study the formation, evolution, and dark matter content of elliptical galaxies. Terry is very involved in astronomical outreach activities, both locally in Kingston, and through Astronomers Without Borders. He started a Ph.D. in science education in September 2009, and will be working with local middle school teachers on improving science teaching using Japanese lesson study.
- HET625 Cosmology and the Large-scale Structure of the Universe: Mike Beasley Dr Mike Beasley has a BSc (Hons) in astrophysics from the Astrophysics Research Institute in Liverpool, UK, and a PhD in astrophysics from Durham University, UK. He has worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Swinburne University, UC Santa Cruz and the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias in Tenerife in Spain. Mike's main areas of research are globular clusters and galaxy formation, but maintains a keen interest in all aspects of astrophysics. He currently lives in Madrid, Spain, and works as a freelance science writer.
- HET608 Introductory Radio Astronomy and SETI: Virginia Killborn
Dr Virginia Kilborn studied astronomy at Melbourne University, obtaining her PhD in radio astronomy in 2001. During her PhD, Virginia spent many days observing at the Parkes radiotelescope, and the Australia Telescope Compact Array in Narrabri. In late 2000, Virginia travelled as a postdoc to the UK to work at the England's largest radio telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory. Whilst in England, Virginia helped to lead the first large-scale northern sky survey for neutral hydrogen in galaxies - the HIJASS survey. She also enjoyed living in the Cheshire countryside... and experiencing a white Christmas! In 2003, Virginia returned to Australia to Swinburne University, where she has since been working on the evolution of galaxies.
- HET609 Astrophotography and CCD Imaging: Mel Hulbert Melissa Hulbert completed a BSc. (Hons) in Physics at the University of Western Sydney, during which she worked as a night guide/lecturer at Sydney Observatory (part of the Powerhouse Museum) where she now works full-time as an Astronomy Educator. In between, she contributed a column to Lab News Magazine and then later spent some time as Assistant Editor on both Lab News and Today's Life Sciences Magazines. She is a member of the Australia Science Communicators and in 2000 she was part of the 'Science in the Pub' team that won an Australian Eureka Award for Science Promotion. Melissa also teaches astronomy courses at WEA and the St George and Sutherland Community College. She has been an active member of Sutherland Astronomical Society for over 15 years with her main interest in astro-imaging. Five years ago she initiated the formation of the Astro-Imaging group which she still coordinates. Melissa's main interests have always been comets and eclipses, but if it's up there and not beyond the range of the equipment she's using then she's happy to snap its portrait. In the last few years Melissa has been learning to read and translate Egyptian hieroglyphs and has been able to combine this with her interest in archeoastronomy. When time allows, Melissa likes nothing better than spending time imaging the wonders of a clear, dark night sky with a few friends.
- HET611 Stellar Astrophysics: Jeremy Mould Prof Jeremy Mould is a graduate of the University of Melbourne and of the Australian National University. He is a professor at Swinburne University’s Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing and professorial fellow at the University of Melbourne. Jeremy Mould was Director of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) from 2001-2007. NOAO is the National Science Foundation’s facility for ground-based astronomical research at optical and infrared wavelengths in the USA. Preceding appointments were Professor of Astronomy at the Australian National University, Director of the ANU's Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics, and Professor of Astronomy at the California Institute of Technology's Palomar Observatory. His career has mostly been in optical/infrared observatories. Besides Palomar, he has worked at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, Kitt Peak National Observatory, and Mount Wilson & Las Campanas Observatories. Jeremy has worked on numerous teams, advisory and planning committees for NASA. At Caltech he served three years as Executive Officer for Astronomy and then joined the Science Steering Committee for the W.M. Keck Telescope, now the world's largest optical telescope. He was chairman of the Anglo-Australian Telescope Board 1999/2000, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science from 1998. Awarded the American Astronomical Society's Newton Lacy Pierce prize in 1982 jointly with his late colleague Marc Aaronson and the Gruber Prize in Cosmology with Wendy Freedman and Rob Kennicutt in 2009, Jeremy's research interests are in observational cosmology and observational aspects of stellar evolution.
- HET619 Major Project - Astronomy & Astrophysics: Sarah Maddison A/Prof Sarah Maddison is an astrophysicist at the Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University of Technology, and the Coordinator of Swinburne Astronomy Online. Sarah has a BSc(Hons) in applied mathematics and a PhD in computational astrophysics, both from the Mathematics Department at Monash University. Her main areas of interest are star and planet formation, particularly the formation, evolution and dynamics of protoplanetary disks. She spends a lot of her time trying to understand how tiny grains grow to become planets and the observational signatures of (proto)planets in disks. She also dabbles in planetary dynamics.
Sarah has worked at New Mexico State University, where she taught planetary astronomy and worked at the Apache Point Observatory testing the astronomical capabilities of an IR camera. She also worked at the Observatoire de Grenoble, in France, making synthetic IR maps from dynamic circumbinary disk models to compare with high angular resolution observations. At Swinburne Sarah is part of the Stars & Planets Group and continues her work on disk and planetary dynamics, plays with a parallel two-phase dusty gas code that makes planets, makes millimetre and centimetre observations of southern protoplanetary disks, tries to understand the chemistry of grains in disks, runs Swinburne Astronomy Online, and is involved in a range of outreach activities including AstroTour and Scientists in Schools.