Posted: October 21, 2008 |
Australian researchers and industry get access to state-of-the-art fabrication facilities |
(Nanowerk News) A $100 million Australian National Fabrication Facility launched this month in Canberra includes a Queensland node, based at The University of Queensland.
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The ANFF links seven university-based centres around the country, giving researchers and industry access to state-of-the-art fabrication facilities.
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It was established last year under the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy, and will enable researchers to engineer and manipulate materials down to the scale of billionths of a metre.
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The Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Senator Kim Carr said the new facility represented a major step forward in Australia's capacity for research in nanotechnology and micro-fabrication.
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UQ Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor David Siddle welcomed the announcement.
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“The development of facilities to support research is essential to Australia's future international competitiveness,” he said.
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“As a leading research-intensive university, UQ is playing a significant role in the development of national research infrastructure.”
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Professor Siddle said it was in the national interest for leading research institutions to collaborate on the development of world-class facilities.
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The Queensland node has received $12 million support, including $10 million Federal and State Government funding, with the balance from UQ.
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Professor Justin Cooper-White, of UQ's Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, is Director of the Queensland node.
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“The facility is more than a collection of leading-edge equipment and specialist clean rooms minimising unwanted particulate contamination; it is managed and staffed by key senior research officers with extensive expertise,” he said.
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“It provides a dedicated facility for the synthesis, processing, characterisation and fabrication of functional organics and organic semiconductors, new generation photoresists, functional polymers and nanoparticles and bio-inspired nanomaterials, smart surfaces and microdevices.”
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The Queensland node consists of two facilities, the Soft Materials Processing Facility and the BioNano Device Fabrication Facility.
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They are based at UQ in purpose-built laboratories in the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology and the School of Chemistry's Centre for Organic Photonics and Electronics
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