Science, Technology and Engineering

Programs

Department of Biochemistry

ARC Centre of Excellence for Coherent X-ray Science

The Centre of Excellence in Coherent X-ray Science (www.coecxs.org) shares a $9 million Australian Research Council grant and a $1.8M State Technology Initiative grant over five years. The ARC funded Centre brings together physicists, chemists and biologists to develop fundamentally new approaches to probing biological structures and processes. It combines world-class expertise in imaging, structural biology, laser science and molecular theory. The project will develop novel high-resolution imaging using the Australian Synchrotron, and ultimately x-ray lasers, to determine the structures of important drugs targets whose molecular architecture cannot be determined with current techniques.

The Centre's Director is Professor Keith Nugent, Federation Fellow in Physics at the University of Melbourne. Professor Leann Tilley is Deputy Director of the Centre and Assoc Professor Mike Ryan is Head of the Biological Sciences Program. They are working with Dr Andrew Peele, Department of Physics, La Trobe University, Head of the CXS Experimental Methods Program, to develop novel imaging techniques. Opportunities for Vacation scholarships and Postgraduate scholarships are available.