Uni Melbourne has $7.5m from the feds to continue to host the Centre of Excellence for Biosecurity Risk Analysis, through to 2025

It was established as the Australian Centre of Excellence for Risk Analysis in 2006 and has been at Uni Melbourne ever since. The name changed to CEBRA in 2013.

The funding does not amount to much by Uni Melbourne standards, an $8m surplus last year is considered “a break even result.” But with the university budgeting $252m in new savings this year to meet continuing COVID-19 caused income loss every little bit will help (CMM February 26).

In Features this morning

Ryan Naylor (Uni Sydney) on what students and academics expect from each other, (it’s more in-line than you might think). This week’s selection in Commissioning Editor Sally Kift’s series on what we need now in teaching and learning.

Merlin Crossley (UNSW) on friendship among academics easy to make, long to last and a pleasure to be part of.

Angel Calderon (RMIT) crunches the numbers on the QS subject rankings to show why they are an impressive result for the much of a much-ness Australian university system.

In the third CMM selection from his new book,  John H Howard (UTS) suggests innovating is the answer for HE in strife.

Graduates are the new Australians we need,  says the IRU

Australia suffers by separating immigration and international education policies, the Innovative Research Universities argue in a submission to a Commonwealth Parliament committee inquiry into skilled migration.

“Attaining a qualification from an Australian university or other provider is a positive outcome for a person in demonstrating their relative standing for skilled immigration visas,” the IRU argues.

“Hence, there should be a pathway that allows international students to apply for residence and citizenship, with decisions based on national policy and the relative standing of applicants at the time. This would not create the right for places but the legitimate potential to apply.”

The lobby compares Australia’s “rigorous separation between its international education policy and its migration policy” with the practise of New Zealand and Canada.

With immigration on COVID-19 caused hold, the skilled migration intake for 2021 should “pay particular attention” to applicants already here, including international students who have completed degrees. “Some of these graduates face an uncertain option for returning to their home countries,” the IRU suggests.

Uni Adelaide experts have supervised training on-line by sinus-surgeons in Japan

Alkis Psaltis and Peter-John Wormald at Uni Adelaide observed three surgeons simulating surgery, using 3D models,  at Hokkaido University, with another 200 observing.

With the operations in real-time Psaltis and Wormald provided feedback on technique.  The surgery used specific software designed for ear, nose and throat experts to show other surgeons how it is done, in this case at ultra-long range.

The other innovation in the event was using digitally printed 3D models with “an almost human-tissue”, feel created from digital images of patient scans by an Adelaide company.

Uni Adelaide reports requests for repeat performances from Europe, the US and South America.

 

Across the ditch, Victoria University of Wellington has permission from local authorities for a new sign on a downtown tower block

It will have “Victoria U” in small type above way bigger WELLINGTON.

No, it is not to assist people who are lost, just another round in the dispute over the university name. In 2018 VUW management wanted to drop the Victoria and be named UoW – which upset enough people, for the education minister to decide the name change was not in the national interest (CMM May 7 2019).

Since then management has been “refreshing” the brand, with less of the V and more of the W.

The Australian Research Council has 52 new members, of its 201-member College of Experts – insiders know this already but researchers working on applications may not have noticed who they need to know about

* Peter Anderson (QUT – Indigenous knowledge and research capacity) * Jayashree Arcot (UNSW – analytical chemistry)

* Gabrielle Belz (Uni Queensland –immune systems) * Britta Bienen (UWA- off-shore geotechnical engineering) * Stephen Billett (Griffith U – adult and voced) * Alexander Broom (Uni Sydney – health sociology) * Katherine Buchanan (Deakin U – bird song and other signals)

* Jinjun Chen (Swinburne U – data science)

* Mark Elgar (Uni Melbourne – biosciences) * Abigail Elizur (Uni Sunshine Coast – aquaculture biology) * Anthony Elliott (Uni SA – sociology, globalisation)

* Marcus Foth (QUT – interactive and visual design)

* Gary Froyland (UNSW- applied maths, including chaos theory) * Anna Giacomini (Uni Newcastle – mining and civil engineering safety) * Philip Giffard (Charles Darwin U – medical research) * Bronwyn Gillanders (Uni Adelaide – biological sciences) * Michael Gillings (Macquarie U- genetic diversity, evolution)

* Robert Harvey (Uni Sunshine Coast – biomedical science) * Christopher Hillard (Uni Sydney – history, including modern Britain and Europe) * Yijiao Jiang (Macquarie U – green chemistry, renewable energy) * Katherine Johnson (Uni Melbourne – developmental cognitive neuroscience) * Anna Johnston (Uni Queensland – colonial, postcolonial studies)

* Martina Linnenluecke (Macquarie U – corporate sustainability) * Yun Liu (ANU – functional materials) * Jason Monty (Uni Melbourne – fluid mechanics) * Dietmar Muller (Uni Sydney – plate techtonics, geodynamics) * Michael Ostwald (UNSW – architectural analysis)

* Anna Paradowska (Uni Sydney – advanced structure materials) * Sridevan Parameswaran (UNSW – hardware, software co-design) * Helen Partridge (Deakin U – information and technology in learning) * Ekaterina Pas (Monash U – computational chemistry) * Alice Pebay (Uni Melbourne – neurodegenerative diseases of eye and brain) * Ingrid Piller (Macquarie U – sociolinguistics) * Steven Prawer (Uni Melbourne – nanoscience and neuroscience)

* Kim Rasmussen (Uni Sydney – structural engineering)  * Alan Rowan (Uni Queensland – interaction of cells with nanostructured materials/surfaces) * Sarah Russell (Swinburne U – immunology and cell biology) * John Scott (QUT – criminology, sociology) * Kompal Sinha (Macquarie U – health and development economics) * Helen Skouteris (Monash U – health services research) * Timothy Smith (Uni Sunshine Coast – coastal management and climate change) * Willy Susilo (Uni Wollongong – cryptography and network security)

* Ngamta Thamwattana (Uni Newcastle – granular materials and nanotechnology) * Thom van Dooren (Uni Sydney – environmental humanities) * Kim Vincs (Swinburne U – transformative media technologies in creative arts)

* Hua Wang (Victoria U – AI, data analytics, cyber-security) * Kimberlee Weatherall (Uni Sydney – law and data collection/use) * Dianne Wiley (Uni Sydney – membranes for water treatment and carbon capture) * Asmi Wood (ANU – Aboriginal And Torres Strait Islander Law, comparative law) * Yixia (Sarah) Zhang (Western Sydney U – multi-disciplinary engineering) * Xiao-Ling Zhao (UNSW – construction using composite materials) * Tianqing Zhu (UTS – network security and data miningO