Distinguished Professor Gaven Martin at the launch of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study.
Distinguished Professor David Lambert, Professor Grant Guilford, Sir Neil Waters and Distinguished Professor Gaven Martin at the launch of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study.
Royal Society of New Zealand Chief Executive Di McCarthy and Distinguished Professor David Lambert.
Massey University Council member Dr Susan Baragwanath and Auckland Regional Registrar Andrea Davies.
News
Mathematician receives top US lecture call
Professor Gaven Martin was invited to deliver the 2009 Taft Lectures at the University of Cincinnati, Ohio. He is the first academic from a New Zealand university to receive this honour. Over the course of two lectures he will talk about hyperbolic geometry and some of his recent research on conformal geometry.
Research Medals 2009 Awarded
Two members of the NZIAS have been awarded Research Awards by Massey University. Peter Schwerdtfeger was awarded the Individual Research Medal and, jointly, the College of Sciences' Individual Award, while Matthias Lein was awarded the Early Career Research Medal.
Nobel Laureate as Visiting Lecturer
Visiting Nobel Laureate Professor Sir Harold Kroto gave nanoscience a humorous, colourful twist with an image of a molecule that looks and behaves like a puppy during a public lecture attended by more than 200 people at the Albany campus of Massey University. Sir Harold Kroto is the university's 2009 Sir Neil Waters Distinguished Lecturer.
Hector Medal 2008 Awarded
Gaven Martin was awarded the 2008 Hector Medal in Mathematical and Information Sciences in recognition for his "deep and wide-ranging contributions to the theory of Kleinian groups, geometric function theory and other fundamental parts of modern mathematics, including the solution of a number of difficult and long-standing problems."
Third Marsden in a Row
Peter Schwerdtfeger was awarded a remarkable third Marsden Fund in succession, which denotes an exceptional recognition for a theoretician. He obtained 780,000 NZ$ over the next three years for the project "The Variation of Fundamental Constants in Space-Time" together with Victor Flambaum.
New Fellow of the Royal Society
Paul Rainey was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in recognition of his contributions to evolution. He was appointed the director of the Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, one of NZ's eight Centres of Research Excellence. In addition, he received a Marsden grant to further his research on "The Evolution of Multicellularity". The grant is worth 900,000 NZ$ for the first three years with an option for financial support for two more years.
Lyle Medal 2008 Awarded
Victor Flambaum was awarded the prestigious 2008 Australian Academia of Science Lyle medal in recognition for his outstanding achievements for research in mathematics and physics.
NZIAS Launched
Massey University has launched the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study, allowing elite scientists to pursue fundamental scholarship with the aim of driving New Zealand forward and potentially earning New Zealand’s first Nobel Prize.
Minister for Research, Science and Technology Steve Maharey spoke at the launch, noting the importance of fostering pure academic research and congratulating Massey for its foresight.
“Brilliant people in the right kind of environment exploring fundamental questions can achieve much. At the NZIAS you have allowed yourself a space for understanding, allowing people to spend time with theoretical issues in the areas of excellence. It allows them to get on and do their work – I think that’s a very important part of what we’re trying to do in this country at the moment.
“We know that the next generation of science breakthroughs comes from collaboration, the cross-over of disciplines, and the Institute will go a long way to encouraging this outcome. This has been the case since the creation of the first Institute for Advanced Study, at Princeton in 1930. It is noted for hosting theoretical heavyweights such as John von Neumann and a certain Albert Einstein. The reputation of the Princeton Institute comes from combining the brilliance of people with an environment that allows them to explore fundamental questions. At the time von Neumann and Einstein worked there, few could have predicted how their pure theoretical ideas would be applied to computing, electronics, energy, astrophysics and engineering, and end up shaping social theory, economics and the study of human behaviour.”
Mr Maharey congratulated Massey on its achievements.
“I have opened and attended the opening of many new research facilities and facilities for the science system this year. Many of those have been associated with Massey in one way or another. Today’s event celebrates the opening of yet another Massey initiative, one that is unique.
“You are a university that has a reputation for being first, for being innovative and for being different and I think that is shown here today.”
Governing Board chairman Professor Grant Guilford says the NZIAS will be unlike any other academic institution in New Zealand.
“Most developed nations have such an institute, characterised by interdisciplinary clusters of elite scholars with the ambition and capability to lead mankind’s cultivation and generation of knowledge. For many hundreds of years science has been organised within disciplines – for example ecologists working with ecologists or biologists collaborating with biologists. In the institutes for advanced study we break this traditional mould and bring together the top people from disparate fields to see what breakthroughs can arise – it’s a case of let’s put them together and see what happens.
“As well as enjoying the supportive and creative environment offered by the NZIAS to support their research, each will be able to mentor and develop the next generation of scholars so that New Zealand is best able to advance at a scientific and economic level.”
Professor Guilford, head of Massey’s Institute of Veterinary Animal and Biomedical Sciences, says the University’s history of foreseeing the challenges ahead enabled it to develop programmes recognised as critical to the economy, including agriculture, food and applied biological sciences; veterinary studies; engineering and technology, and finance.
“This culture of innovation makes Massey the natural home for a progressive organisation such as the NZIAS. Developing a world-leading science capability is consistent with Massey’s leadership of learning in New Zealand.”
The inaugural professoriate and their research teams are all working from the University’s Auckland campus. Associate and visiting academics will be selected to support the professoriate.
Marsden Funding
"Modern analysis and geometry" - Gaven Martin (5 year funding) and "Chemistry at extreme conditions: materials at ultra-high pressures from first principles quantum theoretical methods" - Peter Schwerdtfeger. More
Gordon Research Conference
The Gordon Research Trust was founded more than 75 years ago to support small, elite research meetings on cutting-edge topics in science. The 2007 Gordon Research Conference on Microbial Population Biology was held in Andover, New Hampshire, and was chaired by NZIAS Professor Paul Rainey. The meeting has a tradition of providing a forum for discussion of some of the most significant and often contentious issues in evolution and beyond. This year the meeting was heavily over-subscribed with 180 attendees from throughout the world. Topics included evolutionary genetics, systems biology, symbiosis, and the evolutionary emergence of infectious disease. Posters are a high point of the meeting, with much time given to discussion and refreshments with presenters. This year three awards were given to younger researchers for outstanding contributions. Two of these awards went to Massey University, (Auckland Campus): Jenna Gallie, a FRST Bright Futures PhD student with Paul Rainey in NZIAS for her work on the evolutionary origins of a bistable genetic switch, and Wayne Patrick, a newly appointed lecturer in IMBS for his work on the origins of new enzymes.
Schwerdtfeger named Australasian Chemistry Lecturer
This Lectureship is funded by the Royal Chemistry Society of London and administered by Chemistry Societies in Australia and New Zealand. Peter will give series of lectures across Australia and New Zealand. Following that, Peter gives lectures in Bern, Davos, Villigen, Stuttgart, Duesseldorf and Marburg.
Are protons getting lighter with time?
It is common knowledge that protons are 1837 times heavier than electrons. Recent astronomical observations suggest that this ratio was even bigger in the past. If proven, that would require reconsideration of the most fundamental physical theories, including Einstein's general relativity.
Recent work by NZIAS Professor Flambaum has shown that the proton-to-electron mass ratio has not changed by more than 2.5 parts per million during the last 6 billion years. They used microwave spectra from the galaxy B0218+357, which is approximately 6 billion light years away from the Milky Way. These spectra include the famous ammonia transitions, which were used by Townes to build the first maser (Nobel Prize 1964). The frequency of these transitions appears to be extremely sensitive to the mass ratio in question. Comparison of ammonia lines with microwave lines of other molecules revealed no relative frequency shift. This allowed us to place the most stringent limit on the space-time variation of the proton-to-electron mass ratio.
Media
The Institute welcomes inquiries from members of the press. Press releases and announcements will be published on the website and we will assist where possible to provide interviews, information or exert opinion. Visits and photography can also be arranged. Contact Lindsey Birnie on 0275 345 622 or email L.Birnie@massey.ac.nz