In celebration of National Science Week (13 – 21 August), we asked seven Macquarie staff to share a memory of when their love of STEM began….

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“My father was a professor of electrical engineering and my grandfather was a chemist, so I’ve had a lot of science around me all my life. My grandfather worked for various fruit juice companies and would take me on holidays to various orchards. He was a very practical man – looking at how you fix problems in the manufacturing of juices, as well as looking at the chemistry of it. That got me thinking about a future in science and chemistry. I was lucky – not everyone gets the opportunity so early on to see how science marries the everyday.”
– Professor Barbara Messerle, Executive Dean, Faculty of Science and Engineering

 

“I first became interested in a career in science in high school – I was reasonably skilled at using a scalpel and forceps to separate the cell layers from onions to look at under a microscope in year 7 (they looked pretty cool!), which may have been a precursor to my eventual studies involving mouse surgery.”
– Dr Adam Walker, NHMRC CJ Martin Fellow, Department of Biomedical Sciences

“The seven Baker clan kids were raised by our magic mother Maureen who raised us to love family, surfing at Maroubra, hanging out at Nan’s in Lilli Pilli and supporting the mighty Rabbitohs. My hunger for biomedical research (biochemistry and then cancer proteomics) started when our dad died far too young. His loss inspired me to ask how research might make a difference. I’m honoured to still be in science because of Phil Baker.”
– Professor Mark Baker, Department of Biomedical Sciences

 

“There are many things that encouraged me to undertake a B.Sc. at university. First and foremost were the wonderful scientific discoveries coming out of the CSIRO when I was growing up. It was that sense of excitement and wonder that got me on the road to a career in science. At university I took a path leading into applied mathematics and fluid mechanics. It is in the motion of fluids that nature has provided me with where I get all the inspiration I have required in my career as an applied mathematician.”
– Professor Jim Denier, Head, Department of Mathematics

“I was nine years old when I saw my first volcano, on a family holiday to Tenerife, and I remember feeling completely captivated by the moon-like landscape and towering summit of Mount Teide. It ignited a desire in me to learn more about these restless mountains (and I’m still hanging out with volcanoes, as you can see in the photo of me at Sakurajima volcano in Japan, on the right).”
– Heather Handley, ARC Future Fellow and Senior Lecturer, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences

 

“I was enlightened by a university lecturer who constantly delivered clearly explained concepts in lectures, punctuated by lots of humour.  He always made it easy to understand complex scientific principles in a relaxing learning environment.  I now strive to adopt these qualities myself as I pursue my own goals in STEM.”
– Danny Wong, Senior Lecturer, Department of Chemistry and Biomolecular Sciences

“I have just always found science interesting, and I wanted a medical health career. I started doing chiropractic science at Macquarie and quickly realised I wanted to discover new knowledge instead of just learning what others had discovered. In my second year at Uni I had a eureka moment and realised that genetics was like science and maths combined (my two favourite topics growing up) so I changed my degree to become a geneticist. In that same year I found out I was colourblind and, as a student now in love with genetics, I traced the gene mutations back through my family and found out four out of five people in my immediate family were also colourblind and didn’t even know.”
– Dr Kelly Williams, NHMRC Early Career Fellow, Department of Biomedical Sciences