Professor Marcela Bilek - Physical Scientist of the Year, 2002

PRESS RELEASE - August 20, 2002

The first female Professor of Physics to have been appointed at the University of Sydney has been named Physical Scientist of the Year after winning this years pre-eminent Malcolm McIntosh Prize.

34 year old Professor Marcela Bilek won the $35,000 prize for her expertise in plasma processing of materials and surfaces. One example of her work is the development of super tough nano-scale materials, which seek to emulate among other things, one of nature's nano-engineering wonders - the abalone shell.

The abalone shell is made up of two relatively low performance materials, a soft spongy protein and a hard but brittle material. They need to be mixed together in the right way and structure to form a hard and fracture resistant surface. The abalone shell is made up of alternating layers of the soft material, only 20 nanometres in thickness, and alternating layers of the hard material, about 0.5 micrometres in thickness.

" I'm involved in building materials atom by atom - atomic scale engineering of materials using plasma beams. From this we can create surfaces which perform better than currently available materials. There are many applications for such high performance materials, for example in devices which are implantable into the human body, high performance cutting tools and diagnostic surfaces that interact with biomolecules."

Professor Bilek is working on several projects with industry partners including optimising materials in artificial heart pumps and the surface treatment of glass for high performance glazing.

After completing her degree in Applied Physics at Sydney University, Professor Bilek worked for IBM in Japan before heading to Melbourne to work at the Comalco Research Centre. However her passion for travel led her overseas again to Cambridge where she worked on international projects allowing her to travel to Germany and the United States.

Adding to the list she also completed an MBA which she says has given her a greater understanding of the workings of business which she is already putting to good use.

As for being female in a traditionally male dominated environment she says " it's great, I love it, no complaints. It's been an advantage, when I go to international conferences they remember me."