Who is GutWoman and what is her superpower? What determines how wine feels in your mouth? Do you really know where your food comes from? How can nerds with insect nets protect your food? What is genome editing and is it safe?
Waite research is providing answers to these questions and more! Featuring TEDx-style talks, Waite in the Spotlight 2017 was held in September and celebrated the diversity of research at the Waite, what we do, and why it matters. Selected talks from a range of disciplines and by speakers from across the Campus partners were featured to showcase our work and some of our people.
Videos of each of the presentations are available below. The full playlist can be found on our YouTube channel.
Professor Rachel Burton
Rachel is a plant scientist and molecular biologist at the University of Adelaide, passionate about plant cell walls and all the useful things they can do for us. She is interested in the ways that the parts of the cell wall are made and put together but even more intrigued by how they are disassembled or fermented in the human gut, because they are the crucial dietary fibre element of our diets. 2017 has seen Rachel named a Superstar of STEM by Science & Technology Australia and a finalist in the Unsung Hero of South Australian Science Awards.
Richard Gawel
Richard initially trained as a winemaker at Roseworthy Agricultural College. Following a short career as a winemaker, he was appointed as a lecturer in sensory science at the University of Adelaide. He later lectured in wine and food studies at the Le Cordon Bleu culinary school. He is currently a research scientist at the Australian Wine Research Institute specialising in factors which influence the in-mouth texture of red and white wines.
Dr Nina Welti
Nina has studied methane in boreal wetlands in Finland, measured isotopes throughout the Danube River and vineyards of Austria, partitioned carbon in subtropical coastal sand islands off the Queensland coast, traced the nitrogen cycle in the Siberian Arctic and currently tracks carbon and nitrogen throughout Australian agricultural landscapes. Nina is an isotope biogeochemist in the Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Group of CSIRO here at Waite. Her primary research interests are measuring and understanding the small-scale biogeochemical processes occurring in soils and sediments and their role in larger ecosystem-scale changes.
Kym Perry
Kym Perry is a Research Scientist in the Entomology Unit at SARDI. His research involves finding more effective and sustainable ways of managing insect pests that attack broad-acre grain crops in Australia. He has worked on insect pests including Mandalotus weevils and European wasp, and advises government agencies on Australian plague locust control in South Australia. He is currently completing his PhD investigating the dispersal patterns of the diamondback moth, a major pest of canola crops in Australia and around the world.
Professor Mike Keller
Mike Keller is J.A.T. Mortlock Professor of Plant Protection. He is an entomologist whose work has focused on the biological control of insect pests, and the behaviour of their natural enemies. He has also conducted research on pollinators. Mike received a PhD from North Carolina State University and served as a research scientist with the United States Department of Agriculture for nearly three years before he joined the University of Adelaide in 1987. Mike has been Dean of Waite, Head of the School of Agriculture, Food and Wine, and Director of the Waite Research Institute since 2015.