Flinders trio wins ARC Future Fellowships.

The successful Future Fellows are Associate Professor Natalie Harkin, Associate Professor Ian Moffat and Professor Justin Chalker.

Flinders submitted 14 applications and had a 21% success rate – which is higher than the overall national university success rate of 16%. Flinders is also the most successful university in South Australia, winning three of the four allocated ARC Fellowships.

Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor Robert Saint says it is pleasing to see three talented Flinders researchers awarded the prestigious Fellowships – the most of any SA university.

“Associate Professor Natalie Harkin’s extraordinary work in reasserting Indigenous voice and agency to extend our understanding of Indigenous culture and retain Indigenous knowledges is going from strength to strength,” he says.

“Likewise, Associate Professor Ian Moffat’s research on people and climate in Australia’s desert region has important implications for Australia as a whole, but especially for Indigenous communities.

“Professor Justin Chalker’s incredible body of work utilising sulphur polymers will continue to push back the boundaries of knowledge and create new technologies as a result of the ARC’s support."

Associate Professor Harkin’s project aims to investigate Indigenous community and colonial archives as powerful sites of social and cultural memory, and creative intervention.

These sites can locate, repatriate and transform fundamental narratives of history and collective memory to reassert and determine Indigenous voice and agency.

Associate Professor Moffat is undertaking the first detailed investigation of the archaeology, landscape history and paleo-environment of dryland lakes in the Simpson, Strzelecki and Stuart Stony Deserts in Central Australia.

Using cutting-edge methods, the project expects to discover new archaeological sites, provide a new climate record for inland Australia and develop innovative new analytical and field techniques.

Professor Chalker’s research aims to investigate novel sulphur polymers for use in infrared optics and thermal imaging.

Current thermal imaging lenses are made in energy-intensive processes from expensive semiconductors and toxic chalcogenide glasses. In contrast, highly abundant elemental sulphur can be converted into polymers that are highly transparent to mid- and long-wave infrared light, providing a promising low-cost alternative.

In developing this technology, expected outcomes include novel methods to manufacture polymers from low-cost sulphur and their use as lenses for thermal imaging. Significant benefits are expected, such as access to low-cost, recyclable materials for thermal imaging required in surveillance, diagnostics and spectroscopy.