Critical Minerals, Material Solutions - Wellington (16 September)

Event details

The topic for this year’s MacDiarmid Institute Lecture Series is Critical Minerals, Material Solutions. The world wants minerals, but scientists around Aotearoa are working on what we could make to use instead.

In association with the Wellington Branch of the Royal Society of New Zealand, join us in Wellington on 16 September, when Nicola Gaston and Chris Bumby will discuss critical minerals - raw materials that are essential to many existing and future technologies and have been making headlines in recent times due to increasing supply chain vulnerabilities. Nicola and Chris will present materials science solutions that are being developed and utilised right now, in Aotearoa New Zealand, to recycle, replace or reduce our need for critical minerals.

Professor Nicola Gaston is Professor of Physics at the University of Auckland, and Director and Principal Investigator at the MacDiarmid Institute. Nicola’s research focuses on conducting quantum-mechanical simulations of the electronic and thermodynamic behaviour of nanoscale materials. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi and awarded the Thomson Medal in 2023 for her contributions to low-temperature liquid metals research and leadership in New Zealand’s research, science and innovation sector. She also served as President of the New Zealand Association of Scientists in 2014–15.

Professor Chris Bumby is Chief Scientist (Materials) at the Robinson Research Institute, Victoria University of Wellington, whose interdisciplinary research spans the fields of applied physics, materials science and chemical engineering - with a particular focus on Green metallurgy, hydrogen ironmaking, and superconducting machines. Originally from England, he completed his DPhil in Physics at the University of Oxford in 2005 before moving to New Zealand on a Royal Society (UK) Fellowship. Today, Chris leads the 'Clean Materials' Initiative within the Robinson Research Institute, is a founder and director of the start-up company Cullbeck Ltd, and a Principal Investigator at the MacDiarmid Institute.

Registration is required. Please register here via Eventbrite.

Not in Wellington? We're also hosting this event in Hawke's Bay (7 September) and Christchurch (24 September).

Otherwise let us know where you'd like us to visit next!