The Royal Society of Tasmania invites you to its June 2025 Public Lecture by guest speakers Drs Jan Herrmann and Sara Morawetz. All RST members, their guests, and the public are welcome.

Where: Geology Lecture Theatre, UTAS, Sandy Bay Campus on Sunday 1 June, 2025.

Time: 3.30pm for pre-lecture drinks, 4pm for the lecture.

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Measurements are everywhere around us. People have measured things since times immemorial to help make sense of the world. Measurements can be powerful tools for driving scientific discoveries and technological innovation. Their results inform decisions in almost every sphere of human endeavour, and quantum theory tells us that the very act of measurement is changing the world.

Join metrologist Dr Jan Herrmann and artist Dr Sara Morawetz for a reflection on the history and future of measurement as we commemorate the signing of the Metre Convention (more information here) 150 years ago that established the foundations for how we take the world’s measure today – ‘for all times, for all people’.

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Dr Jan Herrmann is responsible for the physical measurement capabilities at Australia’s National Measurement Institute (NMI). From atomic clocks to quantum electrical standards, from ultra-precision microscopes exploring the nanoscale to lightning generators testing high-voltage transmission components, the Institute’s scientists and engineers help ensure that measurements in Australia are accurate, fit-for-purpose and internationally recognised. 

Dr Sara Morawetz is a conceptual artist whose research-based, interdisciplinary practice reflects critically and poetically on the matter and methods of science. Interested in the systems and structures that shape how we see and what we know, her work interrogates scientific and cultural apparatus that convey precision, accuracy and determinacy, yet remain slippery, speculative and whimsical when ‘tested in the field.’ Her projects involve collaborations with scientists from MIT, NASA and NIST, and her work has been exhibited throughout Australia and internationally.

The Royal Society of Tasmania invites you to its southern May 2025 Public Lecture by guest speakers Dr Sally Bryant AM and Dr Eric Woehler OAM. All RST members, their guests, and the public are welcome.

Please register your interest using this link.

Where: Geology Lecture Theatre, UTAS, Sandy Bay Campus on Sunday 4 May, 2025.

Time: 3.30pm for pre-lecture drinks, 4pm for the lecture.

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Globally, few animal species are more visible or cherished than birds and Tasmania is internationally recognised for its high endemicity and as a refugia for rare species. However, few people realise that for a small island Tasmania has an alarming number of threatened bird species showing rapid trajectories of widespread decreases. Tasmania’s threatened birds occur in a variety of habitats from mountain to coast, but many are habitat specialists reliant on forest or sandy beaches. In this joint lecture, you will hear why Tasmania’s bird fauna is at risk, why these declines are happening and how, collectively, we can reverse these before it’s too late.

Dr. Sally Bryant AM is an Honorary Research Fellow with the Tasmanian Land Conservancy and Adjunct Lecturer at UTas. As a wildlife scientist, Sally has undertaken foundational research on many of Tasmania’s threatened species especially birds and has published prolifically on the conservation importance of island ecosystems. For decades Sally has pioneered recovery efforts for the Nationally Endangered Forty-spotted Pardalote and is currently involved with developing acoustic monitoring relying on her expert field skills in call detection.

Dr. Eric Woehler OAM is a seabird and shorebird ecologist with more than 40 years of field research around the world. His current research efforts are directed at assessing population trends of resident shorebirds and seabirds around Tasmania, based on data sets that span 30 – 45 years. He was an Adjunct with UTas for 25 years, supervising more than 40 higher-degree students. Eric has published more than 200 peer-reviewed papers, almost 200 technical papers and recently authored five indicators for the 2024 Tasmania State of the Environment Report.

The Northern Branch of The Royal Society of Tasmania invites you to our public lecture by Lynette Ross on 27 April 2025, in the Meeting Room, Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG) at Inveresk, Launceston.

All RST members, their guests, and the public are welcome.

Admission:

• free for RST members and children under 12.
• $7 for the general public, QVMAG or TMAG Friends, and members of the Launceston Historical Society
• $5 for students.

When: 1:30 pm Sunday 27 April 2025.

Where: Meeting Room, QVMAG at Inveresk.

To download a printable flyer, click here.

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Northern Tasmania’s attempts to house vice-regal personages ranged from Paterson’s early prefabricated buildings at Outer Cove and York Town to the modest cottage in Launceston. By 1885 this building was so dilapidated it was demolished and the land incorporated into today’s City Park. This lecture not only reveals the history of the official Government residence, but also throws light on such facets as its symbolism and cultural significance.

Lynette undertook a Bachelor of Arts degree majoring in History and Archaeology at UTas in conjunction with University of New England. Her Honours degree featured a thesis on convict death at Port Arthur which led to a re-interpretation of the Isle of the Dead.

Past employment includes working as Heritage Officer at the Port Arthur Historic Site, positions at UTas, coordinator of operations at the historic Saumarez Homestead in NSW and operating as a private contractor. Her special interest is the history and archaeology of Australia’s colonial period. She has recently had her book on the history of Launceston’s Government Cottage published.

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Source of post image: Examiner newspaper.

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Generously supported by

Dr Hanne Nielsen is known for her research on representations of Antarctica in culture and the arts, particularly in literature and media. She has a background in Antarctic Studies and has explored how Antarctica is depicted in various narratives, focusing on the intersection of polar history, gender, and cultural studies.

Dr Nielsen has also been an advocate for women in Antarctic research, highlighting the roles of women in polar expeditions and science. Her work contributes to understanding how perceptions of Antarctica have shaped public and scientific discourses, especially in relation to environmental change and geopolitics.

Dr. Mel Fitzpatrick has been at the forefront of climate science, activism, and education since Australia’s commitment to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992. Over the decades, Mel has witnessed firsthand how disinformation, denial, and deception have obstructed progress on climate action, both within Australia and globally.

In this talk, Mel sheds light on the key players behind these efforts, their tactics, and how we can better inoculate ourselves and others from the pervasive disinformation that threatens meaningful change.

This talk was part of the 2024 PhD Showcase held on 6 October 2024.

Dr Tobias Stål, winner of the 2023 RST Doctoral (PhD) Award, is a geophysicist focusing on understanding Antarctica’s deep and shallow structure and properties. He completed his PhD at the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania in 2021. The focus of his PhD research was a study of the Antarctic lithosphere revealed by multivariate analysis.

The Antarctic continent, with an area of about 14 million km², is larger than Australia; yet due to the ice cover and inaccessibility, its geology and lithospheric structure are to a large extent unknown. Advancing our understanding of the Antarctic continent addresses fundamental knowledge gaps in plate tectonics and understanding the interactions between the solid Earth and the cryosphere.

Dr Stål’s PhD research addressed challenging topics, such as the identification of sub-ice lithospheric boundaries, and the determination of a new geothermal heat flow model for the continent of Antarctica. The research was enabled by innovations in computational and statistical methodologies, including the development of a new software library to enable the multivariate approaches that were ground-breaking for Antarctica.

Since graduating, Dr Stål has taken up a Research Associate position in computation physics at the School of Natural Sciences, funded by the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence in Antarctic Science.