Water worlds and wellbeing: Two projects earn ARC Future Fellowships
Two University of Newcastle researchers have been awarded prestigious Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowships, a national scheme that supports outstanding researchers to undertake projects of critical importance to Australia and the world.
The awards, totalling more than $2.2m, will fund their transformative projects ranging from the search for life beyond Earth to understanding the psychological toll of forced family separation on people from refugee backgrounds.
Future Fellowships reflect the Australian Government’s commitment to research excellence by supporting high-impact projects in areas of national and international benefit.
Understanding how forced separation disrupts wellbeing of refugee people
With $1.29 million in ARC funding, Professor Belinda Liddell from the School of Psychological Sciences will investigate how forced family separation impacts mental and physical health.
With a focus on people from refugee backgrounds, Professor Liddell’s project combines lab-based research with longitudinal case studies of refugee separation. More than one in three adult refugees have been separated from their families.
Professor Liddell, Daphne Keats Chair in Cross-Cultural Psychology at the University of Newcastle, will examine the mental health challenges faced by displaced populations and the critical need for evidence-based, culturally responsive psychological support. Through participatory workshops, she will work directly with communities and policymakers to ensure findings translate into meaningful best practice and policy change.
By addressing one of the most urgent humanitarian and social issues of our time, Professor Liddell’s research is set to inform future national and global approaches to refugee health and wellbeing.
Learn more about Professor Liddell’s research when she delivers a public lecture on Thursday 14 August during National Science Week.
Recipient: Professor Belinda Liddell, School of Psychological Sciences
Funding awarded: $1,285,428
Observing water worlds from space: new techniques to cut through the ‘noise’
While international efforts to study Earth-like planets outside our solar system are accelerating, Dr Evans-Soma’s research addresses a persistent challenge: instrument noise and stellar variability that obscure signals from space telescopes.
Awarded $940,000, Dr Evans-Soma from the University of Newcastle’s School of Information and Physical Sciences will develop advanced analysis techniques to overcome this problem. His work will be applied immediately to space telescope observations of ‘water worlds’ — a newly recognised class of exoplanets intermediate in size between rocky planets and ice giants.
The project will also use cutting-edge exascale computing to simulate the atmospheres of these water worlds — a critical step toward understanding how planets form, and whether they could support life.
The Fellowship will enhance Australian leadership in the exoplanet field, including the search for life beyond Earth.
Recipient: Dr Tom Evans-Soma, School of Information and Physical Sciences
Funding awarded: $940,000
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