Honorary Fellows
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- David Booth
- Gordon Chapman
- Robert Crompton
- John Robert de Laeter
- Robert Delbourgo
- Geoff Forrest
- Michael Gorroick
- Tony Klein
- GC Lowenthal AM
- Bruce McKellar
- Arthur Page
- Brian Schmidt
- John Symonds
- Gertrud Thompson
The Australian Institute of Physics was established in 1963, when it replaced the Australian Branch of the British Institute of Physics based in London. [1] The purpose of the institute is to promote the role of physics in research, education, industry and the community. [2] The AIP publishes Australian Physics (ISSN 1036-3831) since 1963. Every two years, the Institute organises a national congress, the latest being held in December 2022 in Adelaide. [3]
The institute has branches in each of the six Australian states, and topical groups in the following areas:
The Bragg Gold Medal for Excellence in Physics has been awarded since 1992 for the best PhD thesis by a student from an Australian University and to commemorate Sir Lawrence Bragg (in front on the medal) and his father Sir William Henry Bragg who both played a significant part in physics education in Australia. Winners so far are: [18]
The Dirac Medal for the Advancement of Theoretical Physics is awarded by the University of New South Wales in Sydney, jointly with the Australian Institute of Physics on the occasion of the public Dirac Lecture. [19] The Lecture and the Medal commemorate the visit to the university in 1975 of Professor Dirac, who gave five lectures there. These lectures were subsequently published as a book: Directions of Physics (Wiley, 1978 – H. Hora and J. Shepanski, eds.). Professor Dirac donated the royalties from this book to the University for the establishment of the Dirac Lecture series. The prize, first awarded in 1979, includes a silver medal and honorarium. The recipients of the price are: [20] [21]
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Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac was an English theoretical physicist who is considered to be one of the founders of quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics. He is credited with laying the foundations of quantum field theory. He was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge, a professor of physics at Florida State University and the University of Miami, and a 1933 Nobel Prize in Physics recipient.
The Dirac Medal or Dirac prize can refer to different awards named in honour of the physics Nobel Laureate Paul Dirac.
Sir William Lawrence Bragg, was an Australian-born British physicist and X-ray crystallographer, discoverer (1912) of Bragg's law of X-ray diffraction, which is basic for the determination of crystal structure. He was joint recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1915, "For their services in the analysis of crystal structure by means of X-rays"; an important step in the development of X-ray crystallography.
Sir William Henry Bragg was an English physicist, chemist, mathematician, and active sportsman who uniquely shared a Nobel Prize with his son Lawrence Bragg – the 1915 Nobel Prize in Physics: "for their services in the analysis of crystal structure by means of X-rays". The mineral Braggite is named after him and his son. He was knighted in 1920.
Sir Leonard George Holden Huxley was an Australian physicist.
Rodney Leonard (Rod) Jory AM,, was an Australian physicist noted for establishing and running the National Youth Science Forum (NYSF/NSSS) and for his contributions to Australian teams which have competed at the International Physics Olympiad. He retired from the position of director of the NYSF in January 2005. He died in 2021 in Merimbula, New South Wales, at the age of 82.
Helen Rhoda Arnold Quinn is an Australian-born particle physicist and educator who has made major contributions to both fields. Her contributions to theoretical physics include the Peccei–Quinn theory which implies a corresponding symmetry of nature and contributions to the search for a unified theory for the three types of particle interactions. As Chair of the Board on Science Education of the National Academy of Sciences, Quinn led the effort that produced A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas—the basis for the Next Generation Science Standards adopted by many states. Her honours include the Dirac Medal of the International Center for Theoretical Physics, the Oskar Klein Medal from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, appointment as an Honorary Officer of the Order of Australia, the J. J. Sakurai Prize for Theoretical Particle Physics from the American Physical Society, the Karl Taylor Compton Medal for Leadership in Physics from the American Institute of Physics, and the 2018 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Physics from the Franklin Institute.
Kenneth Charles Freeman is an Australian astronomer and astrophysicist who is currently Duffield Professor of Astronomy in the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Mount Stromlo Observatory of the Australian National University in Canberra. He was born in Perth, Western Australia in 1940, studied mathematics and physics at the University of Western Australia, and graduated with first class honours in applied mathematics in 1962. He then went to Cambridge University for postgraduate work in theoretical astrophysics with Leon Mestel and Donald Lynden-Bell, and completed his doctorate in 1965. Following a postdoctoral appointment at the University of Texas with Gérard de Vaucouleurs, and a research fellowship at Trinity College, Cambridge, he returned to Australia in 1967 as a Queen Elizabeth Fellow at Mount Stromlo. Apart from a year in the Kapteyn Institute in Groningen in 1976 and some occasional absences overseas, he has been at Mount Stromlo ever since.
Sir Alan Walsh FAA FRS was a British-Australian physicist, originator and developer of a method of chemical analysis called atomic absorption spectroscopy.
Sir Robert William ChapmanMIEAust was an Australian mathematician and engineer.
The Walter Boas Medal is awarded by the Australian Institute of Physics for research in Physics in Australia. It is named in memory of is named in memory of Walter Boas (1904-1982) — an eminent scientist and metallurgist who worked on the physics of metals.
Michelle Yvonne Simmons is an Australian quantum physicist.
Tanya Mary Monro is an Australian physicist known for her work in photonics. She has been Australia's Chief Defence Scientist since 8 March 2019. Prior to that she was the Deputy Vice Chancellor, Research and Innovation (DVCR&I) at the University of South Australia. She was awarded the ARC Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellowship in 2013. She was the inaugural chair of photonics, the inaugural director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Nanoscale Biophotonics and the inaugural director of the Institute for Photonics & Advanced Sensing (IPAS), and the inaugural director of the Centre of Expertise in Photonics (CoEP) within the School of Chemistry and Physics at the University of Adelaide. Monro has remained an adjunct professor of physics at the University of Adelaide following her departure from the institution. In 2020 she was awarded the title of Emeritus Professor at the University of South Australia.
Steven Andrew Balbus is an American-born astrophysicist who is the Savilian Professor of Astronomy at the University of Oxford and a professorial fellow at New College, Oxford. In 2013, he shared the Shaw Prize for Astronomy with John F. Hawley.
Margaret Harding is an Australian chemist and educator who is currently Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at The Australian National University (ANU). She is an expert in medicinal and biomolecular chemistry, with special research interests in the areas of antifreeze proteins and ligand-DNA interactions.
Robert Graham Clark is an Australian physicist. He was appointed Professor and Chair of Energy Strategy and Policy at University of New South Wales (UNSW) in 2012. Prior to this he was Chief Defence Scientist from 2008 to 2011 and Professor of Experimental Physics at University of New South Wales, where he established the National Magnet Laboratory and Semiconductor Nanofabrication Facility.
Trevor John McDougallFAGU is a physical oceanographer specialising in ocean mixing and the thermodynamics of seawater. He is Emeritus Scientia Professor of Ocean Physics in the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, and is Past President of the International Association for the Physical Sciences of the Oceans (IAPSO) of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics.
Professor Robert Kerford Morton FAA was an Australian biochemist. He was Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Melbourne from 1952 to 1958, and Professor of Agricultural Chemistry at the University of Adelaide's Waite Agricultural Research Institute from 1959 to 1962. In 1963 he became Professor of Biochemistry at Adelaide, but died that year as the result of an accident in his laboratory.
The Institute of Physics awards numerous prizes to acknowledge contributions to physics research, education and applications. It also offers smaller specific subject-group prizes, such as for PhD thesis submissions.
Phiala Elisabeth Shanahan is an Australian theoretical physicist who lives and works in the United States. She is known for her work on the structure and interactions of hadrons and nuclei and her innovative use of machine learning techniques in lattice quantum field theory calculations.
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