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Professor Marcela Bilek was interviewed in 2001 for the Interviews with Australian scientists series. By viewing the interviews in this series, or reading the transcripts and extracts, your students can begin to appreciate Australia's contribution to the growth of scientific knowledge.
The following summary of Bilek's career sets the context for the extract chosen for these teachers notes. The extract describes her interest in two quite different research projects. Use the focus questions that accompany the extract to promote discussion among your students.
Marcela Bilek was born in 1968 in Prague, Czech Republic. She moved to Australia with her family in 1972 and settled in Sydney. In 1991 she received a BSc (Hons) from the University of Sydney in physics and computer science. While an undergraduate, she spent a year at the IBM Asia-Pacific Headquarters in Tokyo, Japan, working on computer networks.
From 1991-1993 Bilek worked as an industrial research scientist at the Comalco Research Centre in Melbourne. There she developed a 3-D computer model that can be used to predict the most efficient mixing pattern in an aluminium reduction cell. In 1993 she received the Minerals, Metals and Materials Society Reduction Technology Award.
Bilek completed a PhD in engineering in 1996 at the University of Cambridge in the UK, where she worked on the deposition of silicon using cathodic vacuum arc technology.
From 1996-2000 Bilek was involved in a variety of projects as a research fellow at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. During this time she established a number of collaborations and worked at a number of international institutions. From 1998-99 she was a visiting professor at Technische Universität Hamburg-Harburg, Germany, where she developed an undergraduate degree program in general engineering science, lectured in physics and engineering and worked on the design and commissioning of a nano-tube fabrication system for aerospace materials research. In 1997 she began an ongoing collaboration with the Plasma Applications Group at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, USA, researching pulsed vacuum arc plasma deposition and ion implantation techniques. In 2000 she completed an MBA from Rochester Institute of Technology, USA, reflecting her wish to improve communication between business and research.
In November 2000 Bilek became Professor of Applied Physics at the University of Sydney. Her research interests are in plasma processing of materials, in particular the deposition of thin films and surface treatments, including ion implantation. She is investigating new applications of these processes to produce biocompatible materials. She is also overseeing a project on vacuum-glazing.
Bilek is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (USA) and a life member of Beta Gamma Sigma (USA).
Exciting prospects in biophysics
What research are you currently working on?
I have a number of projects going. I have just received an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant (which until recently would have been called a Large Grant) for a project in biomaterials, so again in the area of plasma processing of materials. I am looking at using very high biases, very high-energy ions, to produce films and materials that are biocompatible and also very robust, able to stay on the substrates. That is important for coating devices that go into the body, like artificial hearts, artificial hips, those kinds of things.
Biophysics is new and very exciting, and research in various areas of it is happening around the world. Would you say you were up with that game?
Well, I'm certainly interested in getting into that game, which is an important one in pushing the frontiers of medicine. All these devices are significant in prolonging lives. For example, even though we can do heart transplants, there are not enough organs to go round and people are still dying. If we had a pump to implant as an artificial heart, for example, it could save a lot of lives.
Of course, I don't have a biological background, but I am working very closely – on a number of projects – with people who do have that but not the physics background. It's certainly very exciting for me, because I am learning a lot about the bio area that I didn't know. Actually, I like projects where I learn as I go.
Nurturing an inherited project
I think another of your current research projects involves vacuum-glazing. That is now being sold as a commercial product, isn't it?
Yes. The vacuum-glazing is not so much my project as one I have inherited from my predecessor, Professor Collins. It is basically his work at the University of Sydney, where he developed this technology over some 20 years while he was Professor of Applied Physics.
Essentially, two panes of glass are brought together to be held about 0.2 millimetres apart by very small stainless steel pillars. The gap is then sealed on the outside and the air in it is removed. The idea is that a very good thermal insulator is formed. Most of the heat that escapes from buildings gets out through the windows, and this technique could be used to replace double-glazing in cold climates such as Europe. It is also very good as an insulator against noise. So it has a lot of applications.
It has found a market in Japan, where despite the relatively cold climate most of the buildings have single-glazing, without the wide frames to accommodate traditional double-glazing. A commercial product is being produced in Japan by Nippon Sheet Glass and being sold there, fairly successfully, under the trademark SPACIA. There are still technical problems or performance aspects, however, that require improvements before it can break into large markets like the US and Europe.
When I took on this professorship I had to decide whether to keep the project going or to stop it. I decided to keep it going, simply because it was starting to yield royalty returns and it finally had the potential to be a really important product in a number of large markets. I have kept on some postdocs who worked on it, and I'm continuing to push it through. I hope to see it become a very widely accepted product.
Select activities that are most appropriate for your lesson plan or add your own. You can also encourage students to identify key issues in the preceding extract and devise their own questions or topics for discussion.
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