The John Mainstone Youth Lecture Tour takes  a young and inspiring academic to tour the states far and wide!  They will present their work to Queensland HighSchool students and engage them about what a career in science is all about, and how it all started!  This tour is returning in 2021 after having to take the year off in 2020 due to the COVID pandemic.

This years Lecturer is Dr. Martin Stringer from the Sustainable Mineral Institute at the University of Queensland talking about his research on sustainability and energy usage. (More details below!)

If you would be interested in hosting Martin at your High School, please contact the branch chair Till Weinhold via  aip_branchchair_qld@aip.org.au

Martin is available between the 9th of August and 20th of August to deliver his lecture. If a time slot outside of this window is required, please contact Till Weinhold to see if your request can be accommodated.

Converting hydrogen to humans

This year’s John Mainstone Youth Lecture is about the physics of our planet’s sustainability. It took over 10 billion years for the universe to create the resources that we, the Earth and the Sun are made of. But is it enough to power 10 billion people? For ever?  To answer this question, we start at the very beginning, at the formation of the Universe, and end up right here and now in Queensland, to try to understand how our life here compares with the resources that our planet has left, and how our future could be powered.

Martin is a theoretical physicist whose research career originally focussed on cosmology and galaxy evolution, until his mounting concern for our own planet bought him back down to Earth to work on terrestrial problems. Since then, he has been applying the various mathematical modelling techniques developed over a ten-year career studying the formation of galaxies to a variety of other systems, from models of island reforestation and interacting wildlife populations, to future systems of power generation, resource supply chains, and energy markets.