Research leaders, science agency representatives and departmental heads gathered at the Intersect showcase today to discuss how the State’s peak eResearch organisation, Intersect is helping to revolutionise the way the research sector conducts its work.
Headlining the event were the Minister for Finance and Services, the Hon Greg Pearce, MLC; Parliamentary Secretary for Tertiary Education and Skills, Gabrielle Upton, MP and Professor Les Field AM, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), UNSW.
NSW Chief Scientist and Engineer, Professor Mary O’Kane hosted the showcase at the NSW Trade and Investment Centre in Sydney. Around 80 guests moved between displays, manned by Intersect engineers, showing a range of Intersect developed projects.
Neil Bennett and Kate Wilson of the NSW Office of Environment & Heritage talking to Dr Luc Small, Intersect.
Speaking about research outcomes Intersect has enabled for their research groups were Scientia Professor Ian Dawes of the Ramaciotti Centre for Gene Function Analysis at UNSW; Professor Geraint Lewis from the Sydney Institute for Astronomy at the University of Sydney; and A/ Professor Frans Henskens from the Schizophrenia Research Institute.
Prof Leo Radom, Dr Rhys Francis, Bruce Meikle and Andrew Cooper.
"Researchers are becoming increasingly reliant on online resources and vast databases of information,” Professor O’Kane said. "But research takes time and it is also costly. While we have the capacity to capture more data faster than ever before, the mining and understanding of data is still labour and time intensive.
“Intersect is helping researchers to forge new research methodologies, new methods of collaboration and is enabling research to be done significantly faster. It is also helping researchers to access a bigger pool of resources and reduce duplication across the sector in areas including genomics, schizophrenia research and breast cancer microscopy.
“That is why the NSW Government is working closely with Intersect. We want to ensure NSW researchers have access to sophisticated IT infrastructures which will support and enhance our research capabilities,” Professor O’Kane said.
Intersect’s CEO, Dr Ian Gibson says, “our university members tell us that they recognise Intersect’s value and are interested in making the most of what Intersect offers. We will be working with them to make that as easy as possible.”