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CLIMATE CHANGE EXPERT RETURNS TO ANU
Dr Will Steffen has been appointed Director of the ANU Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies and Director of the ANU Institute of Environment. Steffen, who currently holds positions of Visiting Fellow in the Australian Bureau of Rural Sciences, Science Adviser with the Australian Greenhouse Office, and Chief Scientist at the Stockholm-based International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, will join ANU in mid-October.
ASIAN LINKS STRONGER THANKS TO ANU STAFF
The Australian National University’s standing as the nation’s leading centre of Asian studies has been further cemented by a number of staff appointments. Professor Tony Milner, the Dean of the Faculty of Asian Studies (FAS), has been asked to take part in the new Federally funded Australia-Thailand Institute. The institute will implement the treaty-level Agreement on Bilateral Cooperation signed by Prime Minister John Howard and his Thai counterpart Thaksin Shinawatra last year. Professor Milner is also a founding member of the executive committee of the Commonwealth Government’s Australia-Malaysia Institute, which was established earlier this year. Other senior staff from the Faculty of Asian Studies are also working to develop stronger links with Asia. As a board member of the Australia-Indonesia Institute, Professor Virgina Hooker (from the Southeast Asia Centre, FAS) has been helping to forge stronger ties with Australia’s northern neighbour. Professor Kam Louie (head of the China and Korea Centre, FAS) has been lending his expertise as a member of the Australia-China Council.
MODERATE DRINKERS END UP BETTER THINKERS
Moderate drinkers have been found to be better thinkers than heavy drinkers and those who do not drink at all, according to ANU research. In a study of more than 7,000 people aged between 20 and 64, participants were asked about their alcohol use and to perform a series of tests to measure cognition. Dr Kaarin Anstey and Dr Bryan Rodgers from the Centre for Mental Health Research found that people who had drunk moderate amounts of alcohol performed significantly better than those who were heavy drinkers and those who rarely or never drank.
FIBRE OPTICS CONQUER UNDERSEA EXPLORATION
Undersea exploration and monitoring of natural resources is set to be revolutionised by acoustic sensing technology using fibre optics developed at ANU. The technology is 100 times more sensitive than current techniques and the optical fibre sensors can be deployed up to 100 kilometres away. Dr Mal Gray, Mr Jong Chow and Professor David McClelland, from the Centre for Gravitational Physics at ANU, working with Dr Ian Littler for the University of Sydney, developed the technique by applying ongoing fundamental research on the measurement and detection of extremely faint gravitational wave signals from outer space to the field of fibre optic sensing.
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