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The Defence Materials Technology Centre (DMTC) has announced the recipients of the annual Awards for Excellence program at its annual conference dinner held at the National Gallery in Canberra.
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The Awards for Excellence seeks to recognise significant contributions made by individuals and teams that have resulted in successful outcomes for DMTC and its partners.
DMTC chief executive Dr Mark Hodge, along with senator David Fawcett representing the Australian government, presented the awards.
The first award of the night went to DMTC maritime program leader Stephen van Duin, who was awarded the DMTC Collaboration Award.
Dr van Duin is based at the University of Wollongong and is described as a long-time research partner of DMTC.
In bestowing this award, Dr Hodge commended Dr van Duin on his leadership of the program and noted the credibility he enjoys with the SEA 5000 Program Office and other stakeholders in the defence industry.
“We have seen significant growth in our maritime program in the time that Stephen has been the program leader,” Dr Hodge said.
“Those two things are absolutely connected, in my mind. What’s very clear is the respect and credibility Stephen has earned with our Defence partners, our industrial partners and the research community.”
The Industry Partnership Award was also issued, which was presented to Steven Knight from Swinburne University of Technology for his contribution to a project that is developing a corrosion monitoring and prognostics tool that is currently the subject of on-ship trials on Anzac Class frigates, in consultation with Defence and industry partner BAE Systems Australia.
The night’s Project Leadership Award was presented to Dr Mitali Sarkar-Tyson for her outstanding leadership of a project involving research partners at the University of Western Australia, DST Group, the Peter Doherty Institute and the University of Wurzburg.
The project is focused on delivering novel antivirulence compounds, which are active against potential bio-warfare agents including Burkholderia pseudomallei.
The Early Career Award was presented to Defence Science & Technology Group (DST Group) researcher Vanessa Pickerd, “for her contribution to a DMTC project to consider and enhance life-of-type evaluations of Navy frigates”.
The Capability Improvement Award was awarded to the teams at ANSTO and Thales Australia.
In delivering this accolade, DMTC recognised the teams at ANSTO and Thales Australia in their development of a single crystal growth process to pave the way for in-country production of sonar transducer components.
Now in its eighth year, the DMTC’s Awards for Excellence is open to all industry and research partners of the DMTC.
Previous winners of the Capability Improvement award have included DMTC teams working on high-strength fabrics, titanium-roughing capability, alternative materials for next-generation armoured vehicles and body armour systems.
Previous winners of the Collaboration Award include Felicia Pradera from DST Group, Scott Wade from Swinburne University, Neil Matthews from Rosebank Engineering (now RUAG Australia), James Waldie from BAE Systems, Michael Ling from DSTO, Steve Dowey from Sutton Tools and Ian Crouch from Australian Defence Apparel.
