Stubborn cancer cells play a cunning trick when faced with treatments designed to kill them—they eat themselves to survive. But Lisa Schafranek has found a way to starve the cancer cells, making them more susceptible to cancer therapy.
The oceans around East Antarctica are becoming acidic at a faster rate than expected, and could become toxic to some forms of marine life in the next 15 years.
Different forces on bones can tell a story—an animal’s skeleton keeps a distinct record that indicates the force applied to bones from past injuries, breaks or fractures.
Francis Torres from The University of Western Australia has developed the mirror device at the heart of a new amplifier technology, which uses an interaction between a high-powered laser and mirror motion to magnify subtle metal, temperature and biological vibrations so they are more easily detected.
Buddhist singing bowls resonate with sound and have inspired a Canberra scientist to create nano-bowls that do the same with light. Using these bowls in solar cells will increase their ability to capture more light and convert it into electricity.
Genes are not enough to explain the difference between a skin cell and a stem cell, a leaf cell and a root cell, or the complexity of the human brain. Genes don’t explain the subtle ways in which your parents’ environment before you were conceived might affect your offspring.
Ryan Lister’s work transcends plants, animals and humans. Credit: The University of Western Australia
Another layer of complexity—the epigenome— is at work determining when and where genes are turned on and off.
Ryan Lister is unravelling this complexity. He’s created ways of mapping the millions of molecular markers of where genes have been switched on or off, has made the first maps of these markers in plants and humans, and has revealed key differences between the markers in cells with different fates.
Many teachers struggle to make science fun for their students. For a Canberra teacher, this means creating an environment where every student can see the impact of science in daily life. And an Adelaide teacher is keeping kids engaged by teaching science in Japanese.
Brian Schiller says “students can play and create, and relate their learning to the world around them”. Credit: Prime Minister’s Prizes for Science/WildBear
Geoff McNamara from Melrose High School in Canberra has created a hothouse of science learning—complete with a seismometer, GPS antenna and weather station, each transmitting real-time data straight into the classroom.
“We all need science literacy to navigate the complexity of the modern world,” says Geoff. So he reaches out to each student’s interests— from genetics to driving to cosmology— to demonstrate the inevitable relevance of science.
