Alumni Profiles

Dr Heather A. Holmes Senior Scholars

Heather is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Utah and has an interdisciplinary background that includes mechanical engineering, environmental engineering, and atmospheric science. Her research group uses ground-based sensors, atmospheric models, and satellite remote sensing to investigate atmospheric physics, air pollution sources, transport and dispersion, and provide data for human health and public policy assessments.

She will spend her Fulbright Scholarship in the School of Electrical, Mechanical and Infrastructure Engineering at the University of Melbourne and will collaborate with faculty in atmospheric and environmental sciences. Heather is interested in working with scientists in Australia to improve wildfire smoke transport modeling, with a focus on developing new atmospheric turbulence models that are used in models to forecast wildfire smoke transport. Her goal is to establish long-term collaborations with the aim of improving models used in air quality warning systems that protect people living in fire prone areas.

Associate Professor Troy Jensen Senior Scholars

Troy is an Associate Professor and Principal Research Fellow (Precision Agriculture) at the University of Southern Queensland where his career has focused on applying engineering technologies to agriculture.

With research interests in controlled traffic farming, yield monitoring, precision agriculture (PA), remote sensing, agricultural mechanisation and weed management, Troy’s Fulbright journey will take him to the University of Florida to utilise on-farm technologies to benefit sugarcane production systems. The use of imagery and PA datasets will identify constraints and provide the ability for the system to be continually refined and updated, ensuring farming enterprises are more efficient and environmentally sustainable.

Professor Margaret E. Johnson Senior Scholars

Margaret is a Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Center on Applied Feminism at The University of Baltimore School of Law. She has published many articles regarding law and menstruation, including Menstrual Justice. She has advocated successfully for laws providing free access to menstrual products and better policies for menstruators. She is a “Menstruation to Menopause” expert for Our Bodies Ourselves Today. Margaret is a graduate of Wisconsin Law School, cum laude and Dartmouth College.

Margaret’s Fulbright Scholarship at the University of Technology Sydney will involve conducting comparative research of menstruation, law and policy between Australia and the United States.

Professor Yogesan Kanagasingam Senior Scholars

Professor Yogesan Kanagasingam, Research Director at the Australian e-Health Research Centre at the CSIRO will undertake research at Stanford University School of Medicine for four months through his Fulbright. Yogesan will develop and validate a new “non-invasive” imaging system for telemedicinebased screening of newborn babies for sight threatening conditions such as Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP). ROP is the major cause of blindness in newborns and is unique to extremely low birth weight or premature babies. If found early enough the condition can be successfully treated with laser therapy to the retina. Apart from his professional work he has been pivotal in introducing new medical technologies for community eye screening, through the Lions Save Sight Foundation. He is also the President of the Australian Telehealth Society.

Dr John M. Marston Senior Scholars

John is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Archaeology at Boston University, where he directs the Environmental Archaeology Laboratory. He studies the long-term sustainability of agriculture and land use, with a focus on ancient societies of the Mediterranean and western and central Asia. 

As a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Queensland, John will work closely with colleagues at the university on the analysis of plant remains from several archaeological sites in Turkey in order to reconstruct agricultural practices over a period of a thousand years. By investigating how farmers in this semiarid region adapted to simultaneous changes in climate and the rise and fall of empires, they will create a broader understanding of how choices about agriculture have contributed to the persistence and collapse of states, with implications for countries in climatically similar regions in the present day. 

Dr Rita Shah Senior Scholars

Rita is a cultural criminologist who combines textual analysis with qualitative and visual methods to understand the ways in which correctional systems are socially and legally constructed. Her work has been published in the British Journal of Criminology and Contemporary Justice Review and is supported by National Endowment for the Humanities and National Science Foundation grants. Her most recent book, The Meaning of Rehabilitation and its Impact on Parole: There and Back Again in California (2017), queries the concept of “rehabilitation” to determine how, on a legislative and policy level, the term is defined as a goal of correctional systems. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree in communications, legal institutions, economics and government from American University and her Master of Arts degree in social ecology, and her PhD in criminology, law and society, from the University of California, Irvine.

Rita’s Fulbright research aims to understand whether the implementation of human rights principles within a prison can lead to change, or if the ideals legitimise existing practices.

Professor Millicent Sullivan Senior Scholars

Millie is the Alvin B. and Julie O. Stiles Professor in Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, and Professor in Biomedical Engineering at University of Delaware. Her work has identified new biomaterials that deliver drug and gene therapies with increased efficacy, specificity, and control. She also investigates new synthetic cell design strategies as a principal investigator in the NSF ProteoCell Project, and she serves as Core Director in UD’s new NIH Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE): the Delaware Center for Musculoskeletal Research.

For her Fulbright project, Millie will develop topical biomaterials that improve wound healing by delivering gene therapies. She will combine new strategies to create collagen-binding DNA nanoparticles, developed in her labs at University of Delaware, with new strategies to produce bioactive wound dressings, developed in collaborating labs at University of Melbourne. Combining these two strategies provides a route to create low-cost yet highly active biomaterials, with long-term potential to improve clinical outcomes

Dr Simon Graham Postdoctoral Scholars

Simon is a McKenzie postdoctoral fellow and Poche associate at the University of Melbourne. In 2008, he completed a Master of Applied Epidemiology at the Australian National University and in 2014, a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in epidemiology and sexually transmissible infections from the University of New South Wales.

His PhD evaluated a clinical sexual health and viral hepatitis intervention with Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services in New South Wales known as SHIMMER. The intervention tripled sexual health and hepatitis testing, improved the management of these infections and established a systematic approach to testing, treatment and management. This included identifying asymptomatic infections and providing prompt treatment or management to reduce the incidence of adverse outcomes from these infections.

For his Fulbright postdoctoral fellowship, Simon will be based at the Center for HIV Educational Studies & Training (CHEST) at Hunter College, City University of New York. His research will focus on developing community based sexual health strategies that could be used with clinic based approaches to decrease rates of sexually transmissible infections particularly for young people. The research aims to use social media and mobile phone applications to support young people to take control of their health and to make informed sexual health decisions that will lower their risk of infection.

Previously, Simon spent a number of years in Thailand and Vietnam working for non-government organizations. His role included, training large multinational company employees about the risks of sexual infections and support for employees living with HIV. He worked with executive board members to improve the human resources policies relating to employment and job promotion for people living with HIV. This role also involved assisting families affected by HIV in poor areas of Bangkok to access medical services and treatment.

Simon aims to broaden his approaches to sexual health and young people through working with American colleagues who have developed innovative ways to engage with and empower young people from a range of cultural backgrounds to decrease their risk of sexually transmissible infections.

James R. Beattie Postgraduate Students

James is a theoretical astrophysicist and PhD candidate at the Australian National University. He studies many aspects of the turbulent interstellar medium — the birthplace of stars in the modern Universe — by running some of the largest supercomputer simulations in the world and developing analytical, mathematical models involving turbulent, magnetised plasma dynamics. James has broad research interests and has collaborated upon studies in ecology, robotics vision, solar physics, cosmic ray dynamics, magnetic dynamo and interstellar medium physics. He is passionate about inspiring the next generation in STEM and helps run the Young Stars science outreach program in Canberra, which provides inspiring science discussions and activities for kids across Canberra.

As a Fulbright scholar, James will collaborate with Prof. Brant Robertson and Dr Philip Mocz at the University of California Santa Cruz and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, respectively, to understand the connections between local sites of star formation and the large-scale, observable properties of star-forming gas.

Zoe Gardner Postgraduate Students

Zoe is a PhD researcher at Flinders University who is passionate about how green chemistry techniques can be used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

As a Fulbright Scholar, Zoe will work with her collaborators to research a process for enzymes to break down waste chemicals using a cutting-edge technology, the vortex fluidic device, as well as specific enzymes which have been enhanced and prepared for this purpose. In the future Zoe hopes that her research can contribute to closing the carbon loop in chemical processes and be part of a solution to one of the biggest challenges facing humanity today.

Madison Hecht Postgraduate Students

Madison is a recent graduate of the University of Virginia, earning dual degrees in neuroscience and English. At the university as an Echols Scholar, she conducted research in neural development, contributing to her Distinguished Majors Thesis and sparking her interest in child brain development.

In partnership with renowned autism researcher Professor Liz Pellicano, Madison will use her Fulbright Scholarship to address autistic people’s increased risk of sexual victimization. Her study is co-produced with autistic researchers and elicits the perspectives of multiple informants, including young autistic people, their parents, and their teachers. Her findings will illuminate what good ‘sex and relationships’ education looks like for this population and ultimately influence Australian educational policy and practice. It is her hope that this project helps ensure that the rights of autistic people, to feel safe and supported in their schools and communities, are protected and promoted.

Dr Bethany Holt Postgraduate Students

Beth is a doctor who wants to contribute to health equity in Australia and the Asia Pacific by strengthening primary health care systems and improving the social determinants of health. Having graduated with the University Medal in Medicine, she continues to practice clinically in emergency departments across Australia whilst pursuing a public health career. Beth is currently working in philanthropic strategy at the Paul Ramsay Foundation, an organisation with a mission to break cycles of disadvantage and previously worked in public, healthcare and social sector strategy with McKinsey & Co. Her global health experience includes disaster program management with the WHO Western Pacific Regional Office, research on health systems and childhood malnutrition in the Solomon Islands, and primary care delivery and health workforce capability building in Timor-Leste.

Beth will undertake an accelerated Masters of Public Health at Harvard, specialising in global health systems. She plans to use the valuable experiences and networks to make a difference to the health of the most vulnerable groups in our community.