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Dr. Karl Bertling has made significant contributions to pioneering imaging and sensing via laser feedback interferometry, spanning diverse laser technologies including sensors based on visible lasers, infrared surface-emitting lasers, mid-infrared inter-band cascade lasers, and terahertz quantum cascade lasers. His current research focus includes leveraging terahertz quantum cascade laser feedback interferometry for early melanoma detection and agri-photonics, as well as near-field terahertz and mid-infrared imaging of nanomaterials and nanostructures.

Professor Bowen is Director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Quantum Biotechnology, and leads the Quantum Optics Laboratory at UQ. He is recognised both nationally and internationally for research at the interface of quantum science and nanotechnology; including bioimaging, biotechnology, nanophotonics, nanomechanics, quantum optomechanics and photonic/quantum sensing. He is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Physics.

Professor Bowen's research spans from the very fundamental, e.g. how does quantum physics transition into our everyday world at large scales?, to applied, e.g. developing next generation sensors for medical diagnostics and navigation. To pursue this research, his lab works in close partnership with industry and uses state-of-the-art facilities for nanofabrication, nanoanalysis, precision optical measurement and deep cryogenic refrigeration available in-house or on campus at UQ.

Professor Bowen has supervised more than thirty postgraduate students, who have been recognised with prizes such as Fulbright Scholarships, an Australian Youth Science Ambassadorship, a Springer PhD theses prize, the Queensland nomination for the Australian Institute of Physics Bragg Medal, the Australian Optical Society Postgraduate Student Prize and UQ Graduate of the Year. He regularly has projects available, both for postgraduate students and for postdoctoral researchers. Please check his website, above, or contact him directly for details (w.bowen@uq.edu.au).

Dr Mile Gao is a physicist specialising in condensed matter physics, with a focus on charge carrier dynamics in organic semiconductor devices. His research advances the development of novel measurement techniques to improve the understanding of organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and organic photovoltaics (OPVs). He has pioneered several charge carrier mobility measurement methods, including Metal-Insulator-Semiconductor CELIV (MIS-CELIV), photo-MIS-CELIV, injection-CELIV, and photo-injection-CELIV. These techniques enable precise characterisation of charge transport and generation processes in diode-like structures, addressing key challenges in organic optoelectronics.

Dr. Mile's work has led to significant insights into charge injection, extraction, and mobility in organic semiconductors, with implications for improving device efficiency and stability. His research is highly interdisciplinary, combining physics, materials science, and device engineering.

He has published extensively in high-impact journals and holds a patent for his contributions to the field. As an ARC DECRA Fellow at The University of Queensland, he also teaches and supervises students in advanced experimental techniques for semiconductor characterisation.

Expertise:

• Charge transport in organic semiconductors
• Carrier generation efficiency in OPVs
• Advanced electrical characterisation techniques
• Organic optoelectronic device physics

Jacinda Ginges is a theoretical physicist in the School of Mathematics and Physics at UQ. Her research is directed towards atomic tests of fundamental physics, involving development and application of high-precision many-body methods for heavy atoms. Her areas of expertise include high-precision studies of fundamental symmetries violations (parity, time) and probes of nuclear structure. Atomic parity violation studies provide some of the tightest constraints on possible new physics beyond the standard model of particle physics, complementing searches for new physics at the LHC and dark matter searches. Studies of parity- and time-reversal-violating atomic electric dipole moments tightly constrain possible new sources of CP-violation appearing in theories beyond the standard model.

Positions:

• 2024- Associate Professor, The University of Queensland, Australia
• 2018- Senior Lecturer, The University of Queensland, Australia
• 2018-2022 ARC Future Fellow, The University of Queensland, Australia
• 2017 Research Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems, The University of Sydney, Australia
• 2014-2016 Senior Research Associate, UNSW Sydney, Australia
• 2004-2008 ARC Australian Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer, UNSW Sydney, Australia
• 2004 Avadh Bhatia Postdoctoral Fellowship for Women, University of Alberta, Canada

Dr. Xiao Guo currently is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the University of Queensland (Brisbane, Australia). He obtained his Bachelor of Science in Physics from Northeastern University in 2017. He then received his Master in Electronic and Electrical Engineering from the University of Hong Kong in 2018 and his PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Queensland at the end of 2022. (personal website: xiaoguo1995.github.io/)

His research focuses on experimental light-matter interaction phenomena and nanophotonics in mid-infrared and terahertz regimes. His research interests include scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) and light-matter interactions in nanomaterials and nanostructures, e.g., nanoscale electron transport and how light interacting with proteins and cartilages.

Since 2022, He has independently performed peer reviews for internationally recognised journals > 30 times including Nature Communications, ACS Photonics, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, IEEE Transactions on Terahertz Science and Technology, Optics Letters, Optics Express, Results in Physics, Spectrochimica Acta - Part A: Molecular and Biomolecular Spectroscopy, and Review of Scientific Instruments.

He also contributes as a lecturer for teaching third-year undergraduate course, ELEC3100 Fundamentals of Electromagnetic Fields and Waves, with other senior colleagues.

MBChB FRCA FANZCA FFICM PhD

Chris James' research is in the fields of experimental hypersonics, hypersonic aerothermodynamics, and planetary entry. His research combines two important and intertwined parts of these fields: the development and understanding of hypersonic test facilities and the performing and analysing of experiments in them. Chris' 28 journal papers, 2 technical notes, and 59 conference publications cover the design, improvement, and simulation of high enthalpy hypersonic facilities such as expansion tubes and shock tunnels, the application and improvement of physical, optical, and radio-based techniques performed on these facilities, non-equilibrium radiation measurements for entry into many planets in the solar system, re-entry observation measurements, and impulse facility ablation testing.

Chris graduated from Mechanical Engineering at UQ in 2012. Following this, he completed his PhD in the Centre for Hypersonics at the University of Queensland (UQ).

During his PhD he developed very high speed Uranus and Saturn entry conditions which were used to perform the fastest experiments which have ever been performed in an expansion tube, as well as developing expansion tube simulation and analysis codes which are now widely used in the Centre for Hypersonics and around the world. He also enrolled in a cotutelle program with École Centrale Paris in Paris, France, and after being awarded an Eiffel Excellence Scholarship by the French government, he passed a year on exchange in Paris, France. In France, Chris was working on developing the capability to perform radiating simulations to support his experimental work at UQ.

Post PhD he was employed in the Centre for Hypersonics helping to develop the X3R reflected shock tunnel, while also supervising and conducting expansion tube research on the X2 expansion tube at UQ.

In 2020, Chris took on a lecturing position for the year and was awarded an Australian Research Council (ARC) DECRA early career fellowship to study Mars return conditions with heated test models at UQ from 2021 to 2023. He was the 2020 recipient of the UQ EAIT Faculty Early Career Researcher Award and in 2021 a paper he presented was awarded the 2021 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Ground Test Best Paper Award at the 2021 AIAA SciTech Forum.

in 2020 he participated in the University of Southern Queensland (UniSQ) led re-entry observation mission of the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Hayabusa2 re-entry over Woomera, South Australia and in 2022 he led the UQ contingent on the once again UniSQ led re-entry observation mission of the NASA OSIRIS-REx re-entry in the US.

He is now employed at UQ as a UQ Amplify Senior Lecturer where he continues to perform research in giant planet entry through an ARC Discovery Project which he received with his colleague Professor Richard Morgan and continues to develop and improve UQ's X2 expansion tube.

Chris lectures in the School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering at UQ. He lectures both hypersonics and space engineering, covering varied topics such as high temperature gas dynamics, hypersonic test facilities, rarefied gas dynamics, orbital mechanics, rocket trajectories, spacecraft design, spacecraft thermal and power management, and planetary entry.

He has written six popular science article for The Conversation with a more than 200,000 combined reads, and has been interviewed for Youtube and radio many times. He has given invited talks at the University of Oxford and the Engineers Australia Continuing Professional Development seminar series.

A/Prof. Neely leads research projects on quantum turbulence in quasi-uniform 2D BEC superfluids, atomtronics, quantum sensing, and spinor condensates. He is an associate investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems (EQUS) and an associate investigator of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Biotechnology (QUBIC).

His career has spanned three institutions, first the College of Optical Sciences at the University of Arizona, where he received his PhD in 2010 working with Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) and quantum turbulence. Subsequently, he had a postdoctoral position at NIST (2010-2012), where he developed and advanced new techniques for midinfrared spectroscopy with pulsed lasers.

The Bose-Einstein condensation lab has openings for honours, PhD, and undergraduate projects. Please contact A/Prof. Neely (t.neely@uq.edu.au) regarding current opportunities.

Dr. Markus Rambach's research interests are in the field of quantum optics, especially on single photon sources to create photonic qubits and qudits.

Markus was born and raised in a small alpine town in Austria, before doing his BSc and MSc at the University of Innsbruck (Austria). He did his undergrad in Physics, before completing an MSc in experimental quantum physics in the prestigious group of Pro. Rainer Blatt. Here, is where he met a young renegade Brit who had just completed his PhD in the research group of Prof. Andrew White at the University of Queensland. Inspired by the stories, Markus decided to have a look for himself and moved to Brisbane, where he completed his PhD with Andrew in 2017. After a short intermezzo for a Postdoc in Scotland, he moved back to Brisbane 2019 and has been a research fellow at UQ ever since. Markus' research interests are in the weird but beautiful world of quantum physics, where he is investigating ways to make the upcoming quantum internet a reality. Over the years he has worked with verious single photon platforms and used them for quantum information experiments. Recently he changed gear and is now investigating the infinitely-sized space of higher-dimensional quantum systems, so-called qudits.

Markus enjoys community engagement, be it as chair of the SMP Early and Mid-Career Academics Committee or as a member of the EQUS Public Engagement Committee. He particular likes the sparks in people's eyes when they start to understand a concept or idea.

Working in theoretical atomic physics and particle astrophysics. My research focusses on high-precision atomic structure calculations, and how atomic processes can be used for testing fundamental theories, probing for physics beyond the standard model, and searching for dark matter. This is complimentary to the high-energy tests performed at CERN. Some research highlights include: searching for variations in the fundamental constants near the super-massive black hole at the centre of our galaxy [1]; using decades of archived atomic clock data from the GPS satellites to search for signatures of dark matter [2]; performing high-precision calculations of symmetry violations in atoms, allowing the most precise low-energy test of the standard model to date [3-5]; and proposing and quantifying novel experimental signatures of dark matter that exploit atomic (rather than the typical nuclear) phenomena, opening the door to a wide range of previously “invisible” models [6-9].

1. A. Hees, T. Do, B. M. Roberts, A. M. Ghez, S. Nishiyama, R. O. Bentley, A. K. Gautam, S. Jia, T. Kara, J. R. Lu, H. Saida, S. Sakai, M. Takahashi, and Y. Takamori, Search for a Variation of the Fine Structure Constant around the Supermassive Black Hole in Our Galactic Center, Phys. Rev. Lett. 124, 081101 (2020).
2. B. M. Roberts, G. Blewitt, C. Dailey, M. Murphy, M. Pospelov, A. Rollings, J. Sherman, W. Williams, and A. Derevianko, Search for Domain Wall Dark Matter with Atomic Clocks on Board Global Positioning System Satellites, Nature Comm. 8, 1195 (2017).
3. V. A. Dzuba, J. C. Berengut, V. V. Flambaum, and B. M. Roberts, Revisiting Parity Nonconservation in Cesium, Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 203003 (2012).
4. B. M. Roberts and J. S. M. Ginges, Nuclear Magnetic Moments of Francium-207–213 from Precision Hyperfine Comparisons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 063002 (2020).
5. G. Sanamyan, B. M. Roberts, and J. S. M. Ginges, Empirical Determination of the Bohr-Weisskopf Effect in Cesium and Improved Tests of Precision Atomic Theory in Searches for New Physics, Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 053001 (2023).
6. B. M. Roberts, Y. V. Stadnik, V. A. Dzuba, V. V. Flambaum, N. Leefer, and D. Budker, Limiting P-Odd Interactions of Cosmic Fields with Electrons, Protons, and Neutrons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 081601 (2014).
7. B. M. Roberts, V. V. Flambaum, and G. F. Gribakin, Ionization of Atoms by Slow Heavy Particles, Including Dark Matter, Phys. Rev. Lett. 116, 023201 (2016).
8. B. M. Roberts et al., Search for Transient Variations of the Fine Structure Constant and Dark Matter Using Fiber-Linked Optical Atomic Clocks, New J. Phys. 22, 093010 (2020).
9. E. Savalle, A. Hees, F. Frank, E. Cantin, P.-E. Pottie, B. M. Roberts, L. Cros, B. T. McAllister, and P. Wolf, Searching for Dark Matter with an Optical Cavity and an Unequal-Delay Interferometer, Phys. Rev. Lett. 126, 051301 (2021).

Stephen is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Bernhardt group at the University of Queensland. His current research is focused on the theory of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics and molecular dynamics.

Stephen completed a double degree in electrical engineering and physics at James Cook University, followed by a PhD in physics, also at James Cook University, under the supervision of Prof. Ronald White and Dr Bronson Philippa, as well as the University of Queensland's Prof. Paul Burn and Prof. Alan Mark. His PhD focused on using kinetic Monte-Carlo simulations of charge and exciton dynamics, coupled with atomistic molecular dynamics deposition simulations to establish a better understanding of structure-property relationships in organic semiconductors, particularly organic light-emitting diodes.

Dr Torniainen's main research interests are in the fields of biomedical signal and image processing, biophotonics, and applied spectroscopy. He holds BSc/MSc in Electrical Engineering from Aalto University (Finland, 2015) and a PhD in Applied Physics from University of Eastern Finland (Finland, 2020). He has previously worked with developing preprocessing techniques for EEG/MEG, real-time analysis methods for physiological signals (e.g., ECG/EMG/EDA), and near-infrared spectroscopy based analysis of tissue integrity for musculoskeletal tissues. His current research focus is on machine learning in image processing, analysis, and synthesis of biomedical images acquired using a combination of terahertz imaging, nano-FTIR, and Raman spectroscopy. The purpose of this study is to better understand the interaction between light and multi-layered tissues such as articular cartilage and skin.

Professor White is Director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Engineered Quantum Systems, an Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow, and leads the Quantum Technology Laboratory at UQ, which he established in 1999. He is internationally recognised for research in quantum science and technology, and is interested in all aspects of quantum weirdness. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, the American Physical Society, and Optica. Andrew’s research spans: quantum foundations; production, manipulation and exploitation of quantum states of light, both in conventional optics and nanophotonics; and utilising quantum technology, be it in quantum computation, quantum communication, quantum sensing, or neuromorphic computing. Details can be found at the Quantum Laboratory website.

Professor White has worked with twenty-one postdoctoral researchers since 2001, five of whom received ARC Discovery Early Career Researchers Awards whilst working in his lab, six receiving Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowships subsequently and one a Erwin Schrödinger Fellowship. He has supervised more than 40 postgraduate students, who have received an array of awards including a Rhodes Scholarship, three Springer PhD thesis prizes, Australian representative at the Lindau Nobel Meeting, the only-ever runner for the Australian Institute of Physics Bragg Medal, and UQ Medals and Valedictorian, to name but a few.

Bio: Andrew was raised in a Queensland dairy town, before heading south to the big smoke of Brisbane to study chemistry, maths, physics and, during the World Expo, the effects of alcohol on uni students from around the world. Deciding he wanted to know what the cold felt like, he first moved to Canberra, then Germany—completing his PhD in quantum physics—before moving on to Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico where he quickly discovered that there is more than enough snow to hide a cactus, but not nearly enough to prevent amusing your friends when you sit down. Over the years he has conducted research on various topics including shrimp eyes, nuclear physics, optical vortices, and quantum computers. He likes quantum weirdness for its own sake, but his current research aims to explore and exploit the full range of quantum behaviours—notably entanglement—with an eye to engineering new technologies and scientific applications. He is currently Director of the Centre of Engineered Quantum Systems, an Australia-wide, 14-year long, research effort by more than 250 scientists to build quantum machines that harness the quantum world for practical applications.