Centre meets at 2022 Annual Workshop

Centre members and international partners from across Australia and internationally attended the CDM’s first in-person Annual Workshop in Geelong in November.

A range of talks and events were held to provide members with the opportunity to meet, share ideas, and plan for the year ahead.

Highlights of the event included:

-          A poster display, with Wasif Hussain (University of Adelaide) winning the best poster award, and Renee Key (Swinburne University of Technology) winning the panelists’ choice award.

-          An ECR workshop that included presentation by science communicator Phil Dooley on how members could build their profiles and publicise their research

-          Centre awards, won by: Ben McAllister (Swinburne University of Technology and University of Western Australia) - Outreach and Impact Award and Irene Bolognino (University of Adelaide) and Markus Mosbech (University of Sydney) – Collaboration and Centre Values Award

-          A report on the Quantum and Dark Matter Road Trip, which informed members on the National Science Week event and its impact on communities in regional and rural areas of Australia

-          An innovation activity led by Christine Thong (Swinburne University of Technology)

-          Research talks and discussions across the Centre’s research themes as well as keynote presentations from Sara Diglio (Subatech-Nantes), Neil Spooner (University of Sheffield), Pippa Cole (University of Amsterdam), Darren Croton (Swinburne University of Technology) and Ciaran O’Hare (University of Sydney)

-          The launch of the Centre’s Mentoring Program 2.0 and guest speakers Hrayr Matevosyan (University of Adelaide) and Sue Barrell (Advisory Board member and chair of SUPL Ltd) spoke about how to prepare for an interview

-          The diversity of speakers, with women giving 40% of presentations during the event

-          The Equity, Diversity and Inclusion committee’s diversity breakfast and session with guest speaker Virginia Kilborn (Swinburne Chief Scientist) who also participated on a panel with Centre members Nicole Bell (University of Melbourne) and Zuzana Slavkovska (ANU).

Another clear highlight was the opportunity to meet and talk with members from different nodes and learn about the breadth of dark matter research happening across the Centre.