Three new fellows from Earth Sciences elected to Australian Academy of Science
Each year, the Australian Academy of Science (AAS) elects a select group of scientists drawn from all the scientific disciplines. Fellows are selected for their accomplishments in research and their visionary leadership in their area of expertise. Fellowship of the academy is a singular honour that comes with the expectation that fellows will advance the cause of Australian science within Australia and internationally.
In 2024, three of the 24 newly elected academy fellows are from the Earth Sciences. Congratulations to:
Professor Nerilie Abram FAA, Climate Scientist, Australian National University. Nerilie is one of Australia’s top paleoclimate scientists with an exceptional record of scientific discoveries. She has made outstanding contributions to our understanding of how Earth’s climate system behaved over the last millennium, at both regional and global scales. Her multidisciplinary approaches have also brought critical perspectives to modern day human-induced climate change, including bushfire, drought, and the onset of anthropogenic warming. Abram also has an impressive record of scientific leadership, and has an international standing for her service, outreach, and communication, including Coordinating Lead Authorship of the 2019 IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate.
Emeritus Professor Zheng-Xiang Li FAA, Geoscientist, Curtin University. Zheng-Xiang is a world-renowned geoscientist whose work transcends disciplinary boundaries and has led to paradigm shifts in our understanding of how the Earth's engine works. This is important because it catalyses the formation of deep Earth resources as well as climate and environmental changes. He played prominent roles in the discovery of the periodical occurrences of two pre-Pangea global supercontinents, Rodinia and Nuna, pushing our knowledge of global palaeogeography back to 2,000 million years. He also co-developed the dynamic supercontinent-superplume geodynamic model, addressing the driving forces of plate tectonics, and he also constructed innovative tectonic models for Australia and the West Pacific.
Professor Hrvoje Tkalčić FAA, Geophysicist, Australian National University. Hrvoje is a geophysicist who has made fundamental contributions to the study of the Earth’s interior, notably the Inner Core using an innovative approach to detect shear wave propagation and so demonstrate the solidity of the innermost part of the Earth. His breakthrough work in the understanding of the seismic correlation wavefield opened the way for global and planetary seismology to illuminate the interiors of the Earth and other planets. He has also made significant contributions to seismic source studies, including tectonic and volcanic earthquakes, explosions and marsquakes, and to the development of analysis techniques for seismograms with effective treatment of uncertainty in matching observations and theoretical predictions.
Academy announces 2024 Fellows for outstanding contributions to
There are 24 new Fellows elected to the Academy in 2024. An expert in spider venoms, a leader in plant science, an authority on star formation and an oncologist who has changed the way melanoma is
