Prime Minister’s teaching prizes, platypuses with high PFAS and house bricks from sugar cane waste
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Parliament House in Canberra, just recently.

My name is Vanessa. I'm the Executive Director of Australian Science Innovations. We run the Olympiad program with all these fantastic kids. What were the overall results? I think it was four gold and three silver or the other way around? Yeah, three gold, four silver and more bronze. Every student that went overseas this year got a medal, really. Every Australian student that went overseas this year got a bronze, silver or gold medal. MUSIC

Hello again, Robin Williams with The Science Show, in which we concentrate on some young people instead of old politicians to get a glimpse of what the future may hold. You see, the paradox about that election was that there was hardly a word about science, despite its being the greatest influencer of our future, along with young people.

Now, there we were in Parliament House Canberra in that packed hall and there I found two tables with a score of pupils in green blazers, all winners of medals in this year's Science Olympiad. My name is Grace and I went to the International Biology Olympiad in Kazakhstan this year. And where's your school? It's in Gippsland in Victoria.

And you were biology, were you? Yes. And your name? I'm Catherine and I also went to the International Biology Olympiad. So both biology. I see. And what was your result? I won a gold medal.

Did you find it very difficult? Obviously, if you won gold medal, you must have done terribly well. Yeah, it was hard, but it was fun. And what about you? Yeah, it was difficult, but it was definitely fun. Give me an example of one of the questions. What sort of things did you have to answer? Well, we actually did theoretical and practical exams, and in one of the practicals, we dissected a sheep eye.

And had you done that before? No, never. How did you know what to do? I had to use the little knowledge that I had to work out what to do. Did you have the same thing with the sheep's eye? Yeah, we all did the same set of exams. And what else? Well, the theory ones...

They're all a bit too long to recite here. So we had four prac exams, and so the sheep's eye was in our anatomy and physiology exam. Then we also had one on molecular biology, bioinformatics and biochemistry. Bioinformatics. What did you answer in that? Well, we had stuff like DNA, looking at nucleotide sequences. And how old were you then? We were all 17.

And how did you know all that? We had some training in that in January and in April. So this is in your actual syllabus, is it, school? No, it isn't. We were invited by ASI to go to a summer school in January where they taught us almost all of first year biology in the space of two weeks.

And also we got to do practical as well. So they trained us in the labs to be able to do the practical exams. It's like going to the Olympics and you train when you get there and you have no idea what's going to happen next. Yeah, a little bit. Well, when you came back, what happened? Were people crowding the streets and playing brass bands? What happened? Not quite crowding the streets, but yeah, our schools and our families, I think, were really proud of us.

And what are you going to do next? Were you influenced by what you experienced? Well, I plan on studying astrophysics, so not really, I guess. So what are your plans? Try and get a research position. Mine are a little bit more biology related. I'm hoping to study medicine and also do some research in the medical field.

Can I ask you both what you think of tonight, the Prime Minister and science? I thought the awards were really, really cool to see. Not just the scientists, but also the teachers. It was really inspiring to see people who have put so much work into the future of Australia. It was interesting to see the ongoing work that's currently being done in the country for science and in teaching. Finally, where's your school? I go to Brisbane Girls Grammar School. So...

Both girls grammar schools? Oh no, mine's co-ed. Yours is co-ed. How do the boys get on? No comment.

Vanessa Cates is Executive Director of Australian Science Innovations with our medalists from the Olympiads, who did so well. And you heard science teachers being lauded just now, so let's meet one. Winner of the Prime Minister's Prize for Secondary School Teaching, Alice Leung, Head Teacher, Secondary Studies at Concord High School. But what about her shoes? I have never seen before a science teacher wearing Taylor Swift shoes. How come?

I'm a huge Swifty. All my students know that. This is like my third pair of Taylor Swift boots. So I've got very silver sparkly pair of boots that I wear for my practical activities. So when the students see those, they know they're doing a prac. I've got some knee high sparkly boots and this is my third one. So there's like black

gold sparkles. I'm most impressed. If only I had had someone. Actually, it was a boys' school. I think it's a hole in the ground now, but way back. And what do you teach exactly in science? I teach year 7 to 10 science and at the moment, year 11 and 12 chemistry. But I can teach all of the year 11 and 12 specialty science. So I can teach biology, physics, earth and environmental science and investigating science. So everything. Everything? Yeah.

And how did the Prime Minister come to hear of your work? I'm not sure whether he came to hear about my work, but I am the recipient of the Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Secondary Schools. But how did they find out you were excellent?

I was nominated by Dr Margaret Gilea Evans and I had supporting statements from my current principal and my prior principal. So that's how I got the prize. Excellent. So what is your approach really, apart from enthusiasm and the boots, of course, that gets you such response?

I capture my students' attention by using a lot of food in my practical activities. So to teach chemistry, for example, to teach chemical equations, the conservation of mass, limiting reagents. We make ice cream sandwiches. We don't use vanilla ice cream. We use rainbow ice cream to do that, to find out which is the limiting reagent. So what is actually stopping the chemical reaction for progressing reactions.

any more forward I guess once a substance is being used up. We also use things like choc chip cookies, choc chip muffins so we mine the choc chips out of the muffins and the cookies and to learn about mining and the sustainability and the conservation implications of getting resources that we need. Yeah we also use gummies to do classification so there's lots of

fun things to grab the kids attention especially when they're in year 7, 8 and 9 and when they know science is important but there's so many other things competing for their attention. Do you have very fat students? No, very responsible so you know these are you know what is it like the food little bit is best they're all sometimes foods but

But yeah, just using those things, I think really just grabs their attention and they might not be interested in the concepts of the conservation implications of mining when you first introduce it to them. But once they mine their choc chips out of their muffins and they get to eat the cookies and the muffins afterwards, they do. In your experience, how many of your pupils have gone on to university courses and who knows, professorships or something like that?

I have so many students. I teach a lot of younger siblings and they then tell me, "Oh, my older brother is now doing engineering and he just wants me to let you know that he really likes your chemistry lessons." And I think the most empowering experience I've had is the three, four or five students who've actually become science teachers. I've had one student in Central Station in Sydney

We bumped into each other and she was like, oh, you know, Miss, remember me? I had you in year nine. I'm so sorry. I wasn't the most compliant student, but I wanted you to know that I loved your science lessons and I loved science from then on. And now I'm studying at uni to become a science teacher. I think those are the most humbling experiences. Really makes it worthwhile, doesn't it? Oh, teaching is always worthwhile. It's the most rewarding profession. It's the best profession. But when you see your students saying, you've inspired me to become a science teacher, nothing that compares to that.

Is there any resistance to doing science? Do you have to persuade parents or pupils?

Not in my experience. I think some students might think that science is hard or they might think science is not for them. It's only for like really, really clever students, you know, in their perspective. And I think, you know, all young people have confidence. You know, they don't think they are that great. But I think once they realise that it is for them and anyone can do science, there's no issues of them picking up science. And what sort of things would you say to students

your colleagues right around the country, some of whom are having a hard time, you know, just keeping order and the resources and all the other responsibilities. And before you go out on some sort of field trip, you've got to get permission, you've got to get insurance. I mean, the load on teachers, science and otherwise, is pretty tough these days.

Oh, no doubt. Teaching is a very complex profession. It's a very difficult profession, very challenging profession, but it is so rewarding. And I think to those colleagues out there, to those teachers out there who might be, you know, we all have those down days where we go, oh, this is really worth it. But it is. Reach out to your colleagues, you know, whether it is in your own school or in so many of the online spaces on social media.

someone will be able to support you, someone will be able to back you and in the end just ask yourself what are you in this for and it is to inspire the next generation of students. And what about your own plans apart from just teaching on and on?

Going to go to university and write a book or something? Oh, I'll probably go and see Taylor Swift again. Well, tell her what you do. We'll invite her round to the school in Concord. I'm sure to see whether she comes. I would love to go to one of her concerts again. I went to one of her Sydney shows. I would love to see her again. And I hope she tours again. Looking forward to, you know, more eras and more albums on Taylor Swift.

Tei, Tei, thank you. Thank you. A lively, engaging science teacher who still goes for the highest standards at Concord School in Sydney. And we shall meet the primary winner from Tasmania later in this science show.

Our next youthful guest is Fleur Connick, who's been a young reporter with us this year. She's based in Newcastle, New South Wales, where studies of PFAS chemicals have been yielding worrying results. But this report Fleur put together at the University of Western Sydney, involving PhD student Kat Warwick and some worryingly deceased platypuses.

Sorry, I know you're uninterrupting. Do you want to come and see this year's platypus? We just go outside. It's got a lure in its webbing. It's not every day you get to see a platypus. And although this one is sadly not alive, its arrival at Western Sydney University has everyone excited. It's just come in. We have a call off. We're just going to get super binge. We are super protective of our platypus.

I follow the scientists into their lab where they store the dead platypuses in a freezer, just like the one in your home. Yes, in this freezer, so I'll get them out for you. I'm warned about the smell as they unwrap the most recent arrival from a garbage bag and place its frozen body on a metal bench. You just smelled it? Oh, I've been smelling it for a while. I've been holding it in. I've just tried to be breathing through my mouth, but then I can taste it. Yeah, it is something else.

I should have brought my Vicks today. No, no, it's good. This is all part of the experience. The platypus was discovered in the Nepean River at Yarramundi in Western Sydney. Oh!

And essentially you can see a fishing lure that is caught in the webbing of its back leg. Poor guy. See, I find it impossible to look at that and not be emotional. When you look at the cause of death of so many of these drowned in traps or in something like that. Yeah. It's quite confronting, and especially when members of the community are actually picking these up for us. So it means members of the community are actually experiencing this.

on a very personal level. The issue is we have such a low density population that losing one or two individuals can have a really huge impact on the whole population. So it's really sad to see this. Someone left their fishing line behind. And this is third one in eight months in that area that we've lost. I guess the positive spin of such a devastating story is that we now get to do science on this and they tell us more and more every day. This is Catherine Warwick. She's an aquatic ecologist and one of the university's PhD candidates.

As part of her thesis, Kat has been investigating the accumulation of contaminants such as PFAS, commonly known as forever chemicals, in the platypus. Platypus is an iconic species and it's also a species that everyone can rally behind. And when we talk about environmental pollution, it's difficult for people to relate to that. And so when you can give them an animal or a species that they love...

The eyes get wider, the ears perk up and suddenly everyone gets invested. And that's why platypus are the species to study. That care factor. Absolutely. Yes. I think it was David Attenborough who said that you can't convince people to care about something that they don't know or understand. And everyone knows platypus, even on an international scale. Kat is the lead researcher of an Australian first study which discovered alarmingly high levels of PFOS,

a type of PFAS, in the livers of eight deceased platypuses. The platypuses had been collected from rivers along eastern New South Wales, ranging from the north coast in Bellingen to the Alps of Jindabyne. Seven of the eight locations were not previously known PFAS hotspots.

And this has sparked concerns that the contamination issue is far more widespread than once thought. So we found that eight of the nine platypus livers that we tested returned a result of PFAS concentrations varying from four micrograms to 1,200 micrograms per kilogram.

And what do we know about those levels in terms of animal wildlife health, platypus health? It's actually such a huge question mark in terms of platypus health. This is a first of its kind study. So we do not know what these levels have on the short and long term health of platypuses. The worst effect of platypus was from the Hunter River at Morpeth.

It had a PFOS liver concentration of 1200 micrograms per kilogram. Basically, that's really high. It's almost 390 times the recommended safe limit for a platypus.

According to draft guidelines by the Australian government, exposure directly from their diet should not exceed 3.1 micrograms per kilo each day. I'm actually not surprised that we found the highest concentration there because the Hunter River, as we all know, has had problems with PFAS contamination from the RAF base.

This area is the only area in the study that had a known PFAS hotspot. So it was the only place that basically it was publicly available data warning of a contamination issue. So the seven other sites are no contamination issue. This is just New South Wales. Just New South Wales. Yeah. And eastern New South Wales. We did not go further than Orange. So anything on that side is still a mystery.

After the hunter, the second highest results were from a platypus collected from Arimba Creek on the central coast, with a PFOS liver concentration of 740 micrograms per kilo.

That was followed by 390, recorded in a platypus from the Windji-Karabi River at Berrima, which is situated at the top of Sydney's drinking water catchment. And I guess too, when you first got those results, what was your reaction like when you first saw those levels? Yeah, I was surprised but not shocked.

So my surprise came when all of our wild platypus livers returned a concentration of PFOS. I thought we'd have one or two small concentrations and I would really struggle to tell a story in my thesis. I thought that's what would happen. And then, yeah, we hit that milestone.

1200 mark. My reaction was, oh my goodness, it's worse than I thought. But also I feel really vindicated. And do you, I guess, too, find them concerning seeing those sort of levels in the environment, especially in spots that we didn't really know before? Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. Like, PFAS is a synthetic chemical. It should not exist in the environment at all. So PFAS is an encompassing term for hundreds of different types of molecules. So if you think about all eskies are coolers, but not all coolers are eskies. PFAS are often dubbed as forever chemicals due to their half-life. They can take several decades to break down and persist in the environment for hundreds of years.

Not only are they toxic, the man-made chemicals can also build up in organisms and across food webs. This is known as bioaccumulation. Basically, animals like the platypus take in more of the chemicals than they can excrete, and it accumulates in their liver. The liver for all wildlife and humans is an accumulator for contaminants. It cleanses our bodies and that of wildlife. So the kidneys and the liver are two organs that

Again, across the animal kingdom, that's where PFAS and other contaminants tend to build up. This is Ian Wright, CAT supervisor, who is a co-author of the study. The results blew my mind. It was like being in a war room and results start coming in.

This was the confronting bit. It was like being smacked in the face. Seeing results. I'm just thinking one is a rimba near Gosford, Central Coast, Morpeth, Hunter River, and then one in the Ouija Carribee River and seeing it. And already we're forming a pattern.

that with human activity, the more modified the landscape is, the more PFAS in the platypus. Ian is a water scientist and an associate professor at Western Sydney University. And I'm also formerly of the water industry. I worked with Sydney Water and I love rivers. I swim. I love life in the river.

It's what I enjoy doing. It's been going on for a while and I'd love to hear how this all came about. So for me, it came about, I fell in love with species living in rivers and creeks, particularly in the Blue Mountains and all the invertebrate life, the little insects and it's a kaleidoscope of life I didn't know. It's like a science fiction world, but it's real and incredibly delicate systems and

And with National Park and undisturbed areas, you get to see all of this life. But all that builds up the food chain, water birds, lizards, frogs, fish, and at the top, the apex is the platypus.

With cat, we had been looking at a whole range of different pollutants, traditional ones like nutrients, metals, and that is part of the project. We've been looking at pesticides, but one of our colleagues suggested we look for PFAS. How do you do that with a platypus? Because they're hard to find. They're not listed as endangered. We all know they should be.

And there's huge concerns for their future welfare. And there's waterways that they're dying out of. So how do you study them? To study PFAS and a lot of these pollutants, you need to get to their liver. And you can't do that without hurting them. So getting hold of dead platypus found by the public and donated have been incredibly important. And when the first liver samples went in and the results came back from the lab,

The lab manager actually rang to go, where the hell are these from? Because it's really, really big news. Wow. And these levels of these contaminants in the water are so low. If I had an eyedropper, one drop in several Olympics swimming pools makes it dangerous.

It's at such trace concentrations. The ninth platypus tested was the only one that essentially had no forever chemicals present in its liver. Unlike the others, it was not wild and had been living in filtered water in captivity at Sydney's Taronga Zoo.

The study suggests that the platypuses are being exposed to PFAS through their diet and the sediment from the rivers. PFAS is hydrophobic, which means it doesn't like water and will usually try to escape from water. So if you think oil on water, it's that same thing. So when it is in the water, it will generally stick to sediment on the ground. And then obviously your macroinvertebrates will eat that sediment.

So platypus is when they come through and forage for macroinvertebrates. They will incidentally ingest some sediment. They do their best to get rid of it but they will ingest some of it. So not only are they getting it from their food source but they're also getting it from the sediment as well. As a water scientist, and I worked in the industry for a long time, I've surfaced rivers all over the state. I've got 37 years experience doing this. Now I sample water and the sediment.

And I'll give you an example that a lot of people in New South Wales can relate to, particularly Sydney. You're not recommended to eat any fish living west of the Harbour Bridge because of sediment contamination from the Holmbush Bay, which used to be a centre of a lot of pesticide manufacturing, paint and other chemicals. And that was all dumped in the 50s, 60s.

maybe early 70s and it's still reverberating today. What is in the sediment often dissolves and comes up into the water column and then goes back down and it's like being haunted by toxins and this is one of the things that can cast a very long shadow over the environment, the animals, the fish and

Humans. Due to the widespread use of PFAS, it's difficult to pinpoint a single source. Many industrial and household products contain PFAS, including carpets, clothes, cosmetics and non-stick cookware.

In Australia, the historical use of PFAS in firefighting phones has resulted in increased levels being detected at sites such as airports, defence bases and other locations where firefighting training has been conducted. Where it is, we have no idea. And every human activity existing and previous, a lot of this can be historic. So it may have been a firefighting training area that used the PFAS. It could be from landfill, from...

household products that have PFAS in it. It was quite big news because it was the first hotspot we're aware of in the Warragamba drinking water catchment and that's why it's linked to some concern about potential impact on a really important water reservoir. As far as I know it's one of the biggest domestic water reservoirs in the world and it supplies 80 to 90 percent of Sydney's water

and it's one storage so obviously this is of absolute importance that it's as clean as possible. Were there any locations that I guess these puddles were found that had high levels of PFOS but water testing especially for PFAS? I know the water testing stations of Warragamba well because I both worked on it as a scientist but I also worked on it in my university life as an auditor.

I tell you what, PFAS is not on the list of chemicals that they would monitor for that. And even in the annual operational monitoring by Water NSW, they don't test for it. And we urgently need to add it to the list. And this is an important sort of thing to understand what's in it and how effective is your treatment for it.

We should be monitoring all the way through and even right through to drinking water. Associate Professor Ian Wright at Western Sydney University with PhD student Catherine Warwick and our reporter was Fleur Connick. Thanks, Fleur. I'd not visited the University of East London before. That's along the docks near the airport.

And as I explored its modern buildings, I looked through a glass door and I saw great piles of what looked like large bricks with bits of, could it be straw, sticking out? I asked around for a few clues and suddenly met an elegant young student who seemed to be in charge of this vast enterprise. My name is Oluchukwu Okonkwo. I am a PhD student and researcher at the University of East London.

Tell me, where are we standing? It looks like a great big lab, but it's got some very charming electronic apparatus. But piles of bricks! Yes, so we are at the Sustainability Research Institute and we are in our lab where we make sugarcrete bricks. So the bricks that you're seeing here are made of sugarcane waste.

You don't grow very much sugarcane in Britain, do you? No, we don't. So where does it come from? So we work with partners all around the world. We have partners in India, in Brazil, in countries where sugarcane is grown a lot. And we work with them to help them turn their sugarcane wastes into bricks. I see. Now you have a little tin box.

And it's got flakes there. Oh, and I see there's a piece of sugar cane there that's about a metre long. And I infer from that that what you do is put that through a shredder and you get all those flakes. Exactly. Here we have a piece of sugar cane, OK?

And the fibres that you are seeing are leftover that you have once the sugarcane has gone through the milling process and has been crushed with different machineries. So what is left is this fibrous material. It's about two metres long, each fibre, and this is mixed with different binders to make the sugarcane blocks. And in front of me is almost triangular lumps

quite big ones like huge loaves of bread or something. They're not dead solid, but over there you've got brick-shaped or tile-shaped things that look much more like a normal brick. Yes, your observation is very correct. So the first one that has the triangular shape is made, but we mixed it with sodium silicate, while the other one that has more the tile or brick shape is mixed with lime and water.

In both cases, we create a mould and then we fill in the mould with the mixture, depending on the one that we want to achieve. That's how you cast the sugarcrete. And then you remove it from the mould and you let it dry. And I suppose the silicate's generally available because you've got beaches full of it. But that's not the kind of silicate that we use. No, not serious. How do you know both of these forms that you use are going to be strong enough to build moulds?

house that's going to last a long time because there was a scandal this time last year using actually concrete that wasn't tested properly and you had any number of hospitals and schools being closed because bits were falling off.

But that's exactly the selling point of Sugarcrete. Sugarcrete is not a prototype. It is a concept in the sense that Sugarcrete can be manipulated to obtain the kind of structure that you want.

By changing the ratio of the component of Sugacrete, you can go from an insulation board to a load-bearing brick, which means that unlike concrete, for instance, you can enhance some elements in the ratio of Sugacrete to make it stronger than another ratio.

So in this case, it would never be a problem for Sugarcrete because we will customise it to be as strong as we need it to be. Have you actually erected houses so far to test it? Yes, we have. In fact, as we speak, the first ever Sugarcrete building has been completed in India.

One of our colleagues is actually currently in India inspecting it and talking to builders, just getting more information and feedback so we can improve our studies. It will be launched soon and once they do, I will send you pictures. That'll be wonderful. Say during the monsoon in India, all that water coming down and that's made of sugarcrete, as you say, what if it dissolves?

No, that's a very valid question. So what we built in India is a school extension. And the way we built it is we started by putting the building in a concrete platform. Okay. And the concrete platform is by 300 centimetres high. And we have a roof that is overhanging. That means the structure will always be protected. Okay.

And also the walls are being coated with lime mixed with sand to further protect it from the rain. So this is what we're doing. But also when it comes to concrete, the old-fashioned sort of concrete is famously a problem with CO2 emissions.

Are there any emissions from this? Very minimal. Sugarcrete is low carbon. If you compare it with the traditionally made clay brick... ...it has one sixth of the CO2 that you would have in a regular brick. And on top of that, it's also cheaper. Because when we talk about sustainability and all that... ...we also have to take into account the expenses that come with it... ...the transportation and all that. But in this case, sugarcrete is being proposed...

for countries where this waste is readily available locally. Like Australia? OK.

Perfect. We have tons of sugar cane. The whole of Queensland is covered by sugar cane. Excellent. I like to refer to Sugarcrete as the modern vernacular because the raw materials are readily available. All you have to do is think in a modern way, a modern way of solving this agricultural waste problem. Now, it just so happens that next to the ABC where I work,

the University of Technology in Sydney, has got experimental labs like this. And if you went to them, instead of sugar cane, you would see seaweed, which is dried, becomes rock hard, amazingly, often mixed with powdered seashells, making a wonderful, available, in fact, very, very strong building material.

It is very interesting that you are mentioning this because we did some tests with seaweed. I can show you some afterwards actually. We did dry them and we mixed it with some binders because yes, you can.

obtain construction materials with seaweed. And just to mention a few other projects that the Sustainability Research Institute is working on is peatlands project, where we, as well as trying to protect peatlands, we are also trying to create sustainable materials made from biomaterials. So we might have the building industry turning from one of the

worst sinners when it comes to emissions into the reverse because obviously with these bricks

you are making carbon-based stuff permanent in lumps. Yes, one of the great things about sugarcane bricks is that currently in the industry the sugarcane waste surplus is being sold for instance to the paper industry to make paper or packaging. But then the problem with that is that paper is used and easily thrown away. So again it goes back to that waste cycle.

When it comes to brick, for instance, you are locking in the carbon for many, many years, as long as the building can last. And that's the best thing about Sugarcrete.

Well, congratulations. It looks quite wonderful. And your name, which I've tried to pronounce, say it out loud again. Oluchukwu Okonkwo. But my friends call me Oluchi. Oluchi. And where does your name come from? My name is Nigerian. I was born there. But I've lived in Italy, so I do speak Italian. If there are any Italians listening to me. And then I came to live in the amazing London, UK.

Thank you so much. Congratulations. Thank you. My new best friend, Aluchi Okonkwo at the University of East London with Sugarcrete, which won't dissolve in the rain. Any interest in Queensland? And so to universities, Northern Queensland and Darwin and three students who starred in the conference of the National Youth Science Forum. All indigenous and all with strong opinions of what's next. Go.

Gullera McGuinness, I'm a student at JCU studying a Bachelor of Science, Bachelor of Law. What's your town's name? Far North Queensland in Cairns. Cairns? I live in Mareeba. And you? My name is Shania Tipangwudi. I am a Tiwi, Gungungi and Browder woman. I'm studying a Bachelor of Biomedical Science at Charles Darwin University. I recently moved down to Melbourne to work as a research assistant in genetics.

- My name's Axel Athea, a proud young Uyghur Garam man, but you wouldn't be able to tell that I'm black. I was born on Larrakia land, Darwin, but raised on Ghana country, so Adelaide, and I'm studying a Bachelor of Biotechnology. - Why did you come to the forum?

So I'm part of the Young Indigenous Women's STEM Academy. They're a group that empower Indigenous women to achieve in STEM and study STEM careers. And they had offered me the chance to come to the National Youth STEM Summit, and I'm not one to say no to a good opportunity. So what do you think about what's happened so far? It has been excellent. The speakers they have had are absolutely amazing, but I think the best thing about it is the networks I've made so far.

because we're the cusp of our careers. What amazes me the most is you never know, 20 years time, we could all be working side by side together again and get the revelation and the fun little idea of, oh, I met you at the National East STEM Summit in 2024. And I think that would be absolutely amazing, that kind of network. Splendid. Now, on my left, remind me of your name. Shania Tsepunguri. Shania Tsepunguri.

And what's the difference, you see, if you're going to join in what is mainly, if you like, Western traditional science with the kind of science you may have been growing up with, how do you put them together? How do they relate? Well, yeah, as I mentioned, they're very different things, but you kind of have to address it in a really open-minded manner. And one thing that I'm really passionate about is Indigenous knowledges and integrating everything that I know about my culture and my peoples into

things that I do in everyday life, like at work and study. I want to become a doctor eventually, but I also want to go on to become a health minister so I can integrate my knowledge into the health framework.

across Australia. You have it really worked out, haven't you? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I thought very hard about it and I know what I want to do and I want to do it. Had any conflict between your traditional science and the other sort? Oh, the most conflicting thing would be just the way that we practice medicine in general. In my culture, I'm

I'm pretty sure all Aboriginal peoples across Australia use the term social and emotional well-being. And that's something that looks at all aspects of your life and how different aspects of your life impact your health. So your mental health, your social life, your connection with your family, your friends, your connection to country, that's really important to our health. Whereas in Western medicine, you don't look at things like that. You're mostly just looking at your symptoms and how to treat your symptoms and not treating the person.

You're nodding like crazy. What do you think? Based on what Shania said, a lot of science and STEM education, I think, is based off of profit and how much money can be made. And I feel like that inhibits science quite a lot. I think people might see more short-term, which is reasonable, because they're trying to look after themselves and look after their families and their own life.

But I'm really interested in contributing to something that goes beyond our current lifetime and seeing what science looks like in the future. And I think that's something that indigenous people all around the country, around the world, have done really, really well. Now you're speaking as if there is one sort of experience

indigenous attitude to science? Is there just one? I would say definitely not considering how diverse and how many nations are currently in Australia and also how indigenous cultures are around the world. I can't speak on America. What about the range? Because if you just look at the number of indigenous languages there are in this country, what is it, 300 or so? 300, but it's not just the language. So break down the two different sciences, you've got to break down the two worlds.

And so let's take the wheel, for example, and break it down. Let me ask you a question. Did Aboriginal people have the wheel? Well, I remember when somebody called Morgan from Western Mining was asked that on ABC Radio. And he said, well, all these years, all those thousands of years, and you didn't actually invent the wheel. But the question is, do you need a wheel? That's where you can break down the two different worlds. So

The Western world's wheel is a physical thing that changed your landscapes. Our wheel is in our minds, it's engraved in who we are. It's a circle of our systems, how we live with the environment, live with nature, live with everything around us, and that's what our science is built on.

So it's all about living with the world instead of changing it. Do you know there's somebody called Lynette Russell at Monash University, Indigenous Studies, and she wrote a book on innovation and she has written exactly what you just said. Let's just take... We'll have a look at the science of contraception. So back before colonialism, did Aboriginal people have...

contraception. So this is where the simplistic of the science come in and a bit of fun. So when the scientist went to his mother's family and asked, do you have anything for contraception? They gave him a leaf that gave him a runs. And they're like, oh, that's not contraception. But if you think about it, if you truly think about it, the simplicity of it

It's a form of contraception, isn't it? If you've got diarrhoea, you're not very sexy. Exactly. So you wouldn't exactly want to be creating the next generation while your bowels are going through you, are they? On the other hand, that technique would not necessarily be as popular these days, would it? No, I don't think so. LAUGHTER

But I think that's where you can find a bit of an intersection between Western medicine and First Nations people's medicine. When it comes to science education, let me ask you all three something that came up when I was talking to someone in the far north of Queensland. In fact, one of the people associated with James Cook University. And that is, spare the gimmicks.

Don't have all these cute robots and all the fun stuff, which, OK, intrigues you for a bit. But what he is recommending is something that gets you through the course to qualify you in recognised academic stuff while you're at school and university. Would you agree or not? That's exactly it. So the way you use gimmicks, I call it tokenistic. Let's have a look at our schools at the moment. You have the Aboriginal kids being segregated...

to learn their culture, taught to them, not by their families, but by the school, instead of being in class learning. And so if you have that going on where you're being taken out of maybe your physics, your chemistry, your math or science class to go and learn

Aboriginal culture, it's not going to help you in the long run because if you have a look what the education system is there for, it's there so you can get an education to eventually go into either a trade or tertiary education. And yes, our worlds can coexist.

But at the end of the day, to live a good life and get a job, we go into the Western world. It's all based on the Western world. And two years ago, I was invited to the function in Cairns where they asked Aboriginal students that were in tertiary fields to come and talk about what we can do to help Aboriginal kids in the system because why are they slipping through the cracks?

The entire time they spent dreaming of perfect schools where everyone gets to learn culture. You've got a river flowing through the school. You've got all the bush tucker there. I had a go at them at the end of it.

I walked out of there angry at them by the end of it saying, you're living with the fairies. We're not living realistically. And I pointed outside. Whose world are we living in? This is our land. It is, but it's not our world anymore. Our worlds need to coexist. And what you were dreaming of here helps no one because they had not talked about short-term and long-term solutions. So if you think about kids that are struggling, you've got to have a look at their home life.

the alcohol violence and domestic abuse. Those are what drags them down and school doesn't help. Think about it, if you don't have shoes, if you don't have a nice uniform, you don't have lunch and a lot of Aboriginal communities and families, shame's a big thing and so if you're going to school without those things you're not going to learn read or write because you feel the gaze of everyone around you, you don't feel like you belong and so

I was hoping we'd start discussions about providing school books, providing free uniforms, providing free lunches. And then after we get through the short-term solution, what would be the long-term solution, such as helping their reading and mathematics levels? And then not only that, a lot of these families and communities, they don't get to see examples. All they will probably know is what their family is showing them, which is the drug and alcohol abuse.

They need to be shown that people like them in these sort of fields, and that's sort of a long-term sort of solution. But there was none of that. It was the gimmicks, as you just said. And so we need to try and have a way to learn with both worlds. And so I'll use my own case for an example. I'm a drone pilot. Ran a bit of a drone club in school, and my dad bought me my first Mavic Pro.

which I used to just fly and check on the sheep until one of my elders, my mother's elders, was struggling to get to a site that he had to show my dad down a bit of a steep hill. So my dad asked, do you want to take a drone down there? Then I sort of realised that

a Western technology and my own culture could coexist. And so now I use drone technology and geospatial sciences to preserve and protect my culture. So we have one Minister for Science, we have one Minister for Health, we have one drone pilot, and what would you like to be? I'm currently interested in Indigenous genomics. There's an Australian alliance in an Indigenous genomics network around Australia, and I was fortunate enough to attend a conference. And one thing

That was huge, apart from the resources and infrastructure that has a negative effect on communities and thus education, is how to communicate what could be seen as foreign concepts to people who don't have the set STEM education from five years old to year 12. And finally, you. Tell me, we've already made you a minister before.

Before you become Minister for Health, what are you going to do next immediately? Well, I'm going to finish my Bachelor's in Biomedical Science. Once I finish, I think I want to do a PhD in something to do with indigestionomics because I want to learn more about that and...

learn how to, I guess, create guidelines based around Indigenous genomics so that that can be used to improve health outcomes. Because when you know what's happening in your genes and in your DNA and whether you're predisposed to this and that, you can help to prevent these chronic diseases or whatever else you're predisposed to from happening. The Australian Alliance in Indigenous Genomics is looking into this and I would definitely...

recommend everybody to get interested in that and if you are an indigenous person looking interested in genomics I would look into I believe it's called SING it's a summer internship program in indigenous genomics and that's international too it's not just for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Thank you all three very kind Three of the stars of the last National Youth Forum Summit in Canberra as Chief Scientist Cathy Foley remarked the forum has been a friendly vehicle for many a present day scientific leader in Australia

And so to another leader, our second science teacher winning the Prime Minister's Prize, this time for primary school science. Daniel Edwards of Burnie, Tasmania, is noted for his Green Power Electric Vehicle Challenge and Green STEM charity. So the main thing being my role at Montello Primary School and some of these other things and expanding well beyond the classroom at Montello. Your role, what's your secret? I think it's about...

Enabling students to be drivers of their own learning, making connections to things that they're interested about, that they've experienced. Enabling them to be connecting STEM to their experiences and their skills, things that they're passionate about and realising that they can use their learning there and apply that to solve

all relevant real world problems. And that's something that's really exciting and really empowering once they realise that they're not just learning knowledge or in fact, something that they can use and it opens unlimited opportunities as far as things that they can further explore and learn more about. So I think that's the really key thing

is enabling all students to have success and find the things that they're passionate about and connecting that to STEM. Of course, you're quite a long way from Hobart, aren't you? But do you visit much with the pupils? Not for a few years. Let me just explain why I ask that question, because if you walk around Hobart...

It's clearly a science city. You go to the waterfront, you go into Mawson's Hut, all those sorts of things. There is the big ship that goes south. There's the Antarctic Division and so on. Yeah, so in Burnie, we're about three and a half hours drive away from Hobart. Some amazing things in Hobart and...

through GreenStem and through some of the other things that I'm involved with. I travel to Hobart, but there are a number of barriers as far as getting students there. So costs, accommodation, risk assessments. Permission from parents. Permission from parents. But in saying that, Bernie, one of our names is Bernie the City of Makers, which is something that I'm really passionate about. And I see my role really as inspiring students to not only own that and continue developing it, but the City of Changemakers. Makers. Makers of what?

Well, this has gone through plenty of phases. It used to be makers of paper, but not anymore. I guess it's people that are able to make anything that they're interested in. So through the Makers Technology and Innovation Hub that the University of Tasmania has recently opened, we've been, over the last six months, been fortunate enough to be involved with quite a few opportunities there, engaging the wider community with STEM outreach events.

which is something that's been really awesome and something we look forward to continuing to strengthen that relationship and connect all young people in the region to some really awesome opportunities and standards. Of course, you must have had the experience as many cities have around Australia. For instance, Newcastle, once BHP city, and then that stopped.

Turn it around, look for new industries. Similarly in Geelong, similarly in Fremantle. On it goes. And you in that transition as well, science-led perhaps. Yeah, so we do have a history of manufacturing for mining equipment, Caterpillar and Elphinstone at Burnie, but that's something that's continued to change and develop over especially the last decade. And I guess we're at that stage moving into that next phase. So what does 21st century making look like? What does the future of making look like in Burnie?

So a great opportunity for us to be involved with that and continue to build on that long history and long heritage. We make change and I think that's a really great opportunity to be able to lead that and something that I want to be able to inspire with young people. Finally and briefly, what do the pupils in your school say about you and science? Oh, I don't know if I can repeat some of those things. The best feedback I've ever received is a student that said, you know, Mr Edwards makes things come true that I didn't even realise were possible.

And that sums it up, sums up better than any way I could ever explain it. Things that they could never even conceive being possible, but through the opportunities that I've been able to provide for them, they just see so many other things opening up for them. So many other opportunities and opportunities

they're able to, I guess, take that further and apply that and continue following unlimited pathways and opening so many possibilities for their future. So to me, that's the best. Says it all. Exactly. It says it all. So similar things from a lot of other students, but I guess that's definitely the most impactful and something that will stay with me forever. Thanks and congratulations. Thank you very much. Such an accolade. Science teacher and enabler Daniel Edwards at the Montello School in Burnie, Tasmania, with his green STEM education program.

Winning the Prime Minister's Prize for Teaching in Primary Schools. And we finish in the Southern Isle with another top performer. It's David Hamilton, one of our ABC Top 5 scientists. And he's introduced by another. Welcome. I'm your host, Louisa Olmo, from the Department of New South Wales Primary Industries. And I'm joined here today by Dr David Hamilton from Tasmania, who is a professor at the University of New South Wales.

So David, what do you do on a daily basis and what is your field? I'm a conservation ecologist. So that means that I'm working on parts of the ecosystem in Tasmania specifically that I work in. But most of my research focuses on the Daziyurids. So the Daziyurids are the marsupial carnivores. So Tasmanian devils are the best known one. And I do a lot of work on a lesser known one,

We have two species of them in Tasmania. So these are the quolls. They're spotty relatives of the Tasmanian devils that run around the landscape eating insects and smaller things in the landscape.

going about their daily business. So much of my research focuses around them, which is fantastic. They're an important part of the ecosystem. So we definitely hear about Tasmanian devils all the time, but why not so much quolls? I feel like Tasmanian devils have been in the news a lot over the last 20 years because they've been struggling with this disease called devil facial tumour disease, which is a transmissible form of cancer that's been decimating their population since it was first discovered in the mid-90s.

And that means they've been in the press a lot because it's a confronting disease to start off with seeing these poor animals suffering. And we know they've had declines of in excess of 80% in some areas. So we're seeing far, far fewer devils than we used to when you're going back into the 80s or the 90s. That press has meant that a lot of the other species go under the radar a little bit. One of the species I work on, the eastern koalas, had

Pretty dramatic declines in that same time period, but it's gone under the radar because people are talking about Tasmanian devils much of the time too, and the Eastern Quoll has quietly gone on a little bit of a downward slide over that period. Interesting. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I hear that the facial tumour cancer, it's somewhat improving, right?

Is that true? And if so, will there be room for more research onto some of the other important animals? Yeah, definitely. So the devil facial tumour disease scenario is not as dire as we thought it was. If you'd asked someone who works on Tasmanian devils maybe 10, 15 years ago, they would have said there's a good chance that we could lose Tasmanian devils before 2030 almost. But in the

In the last five, six years, we've seen animals that are actually able to actively fight it off with their own immune system. So previously, we were getting animals turning up with tumours, maybe the size of a grape or so. We'd come back three months later, it would get bigger. Three months later, it would be even bigger.

And then eventually the tumours get too much for the immune system to deal with and the animal passes away. But we've had an increasing number of cases of animals that have turned up again with a tumour about the size of a grape, come back three months later and it's completely disappeared. Yeah, that's so good to hear because, you know, it's often very doom and gloom in conservation.

But in other stuff that you do, is there any hope for other areas for conservation? There's definitely hope for conservation. It's a difficult field to be in sometimes because, as you say, a lot of the news can be quite negative. We're losing all this habitat. Koalas are disappearing in certain areas. So it's nice to be working in some areas where we're trying to make a positive difference as well. So much of the research that we're doing on eastern koalas is trying to figure out why they're declining in certain areas versus others.

And the reason that we're doing that is so we can try and mitigate some of these declines, so we can do something about them. So we're not just sitting back at a stage where we're seeing an animal is declining, we're getting in and trying to actively do something about it. Saying that eastern quolls are declining in a certain area because there's too many cats or because their habitat has disappeared. But there's something we can do about that. We can try and get rid of a few of the cats or we can supplement the habitat in some way.

So being able to actually actively have a solution for something like that makes it much more of a positive field to work in sometimes rather than just focusing on the negative. Thank you so much for joining me. That was so informative. Wonderful. Thanks for talking to me. David Hamilton from the University of Tasmania with Louisa Ulmer, both ABC Top 5 scientists this year.

ending our line-up of young stars in today's programme. And in next week's Science Show, some very old stars, your ancestors, the mammals, with evidence, that's compelling evidence, that they began in Australia, just like birdsong. This nation has a natural history you dare not underestimate.

Production by young star David Fisher. Yes, everyone is younger than I am, with the exception of Mick Jagger and Marley's Ghost. I'm Robin Williams. You've been listening to an ABC podcast. Discover more great ABC podcasts, live radio and exclusives on the ABC Listen app.