Ian D. Rae
President

Ian Rae holds an Honorary Professorial Fellowship in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Melbourne, Australia and a part-time appointment as Technical Director for the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering. He is a Fellow of the Academy and of the RACI, of which he is the current President and for which he writes a monthly "Letter from Melbourne" column in Chemistry in Australia.

A chemist by training, Professor Rae has extensive university experience, as dean of science at Monash and deputy vice-chancellor at Victoria University. His research experience has led to approximately 200 refereed publications in chemistry and history of science. He played a leading role in secondary school chemistry in Victoria during the 1980s and 1990s, assisting with curriculum development and acting as examiner for the Higher School Certificate and the Victorian Certificate of Education. He was also a member of the panel that reviewed the VCE in 1997.

He has been heavily involved in the formulation of policy regarding hazardous wastes, air pollution, Australia's National Pollutant Inventory, and control of ozone depleting substances. This advisory role has been exercised with his state government, the Commonwealth Department of the Environment and heritage, Australia's national council of environment ministers, Australia's Industrial Chemical Scheme (NICNAS), and the United Nations Environment Programme.

As a historian, his interests have been mainly in nineteenth century and twentieth chemistry and chemical technology, publishing work on the Russian chemist Alexandr Borodin, discovery of spectroscopy by Stokes and Kirchhoff, formation of chemical societies in Australia and New Zealand, chemical education, wood distillation, national environment policy, the development of explosives and the mining and processing of arsenic in Australia.

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Bob Watts
President-Elect

Following his retirement at the beginning of 2004, Professor Bob Watts (FAA, FTSE, FRACI) has worked part time as a technology consultant.

Bob became Vice President & Chief Scientist of Technology for Broken Hill Pty Ltd in February 2002. In this role, Bob was responsible for providing Technology development throughout the BHP Billiton Group. He managed teams to develop and transfer research findings to industry, including establishing feasibility trials and taking results through to commercialisation.

Professor Watts joined BHP in 1997 as Chief Scientist. In his earlier role Bob was responsible for ensuring technology standards across the Company including new capital projects and interaction with University and other external R&D providers.

He has considerable experience in change management, and has designed and implemented new structures in computer management (University of Washington, Australian National University) and academic departments (University of Melbourne, University of Washington). While with BHP Billiton he designed and implemented new management systems to ensure smooth operation of the Technology function post-merger.

Professor Watts has extensive experience in computational chemistry; modelling of complex molecular systems; experimental atomic and molecular physics; R&D in an industrial setting; problem solving in the resource industry; management issues in complex commercial settings. Bob also has extensive experience in research and teaching roles in Universities in Canada, the USA and Australia.

Bob Watts serves on several advisory bodies, including the Australian Research Council and several Universities. He is President-Elect of the RACI Inc.

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Graham Taylor
Honorary General Treasurer

Graham Taylor is a graduate in applied Chemistry from the Gordon Institute of Technology, Geelong, and was employed by Shell Chemical (Australia) Pty. Ltd. for more than thirty years, where he was technical Manager, Industrial Chemicals, for many years. Now semi retired he runs his own consultancy engaged in technical and safety work in the shipping industry. Graham has held the position of The RACI Victorian Branch Treasurer at two different periods, and was Branch Secretary before his election as Honorary General Treasurer.

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Jan Hosking
Honorary General Secretary

Mrs Jan Hosking (BAppl Sc, FRACI, CChem) was employed by CSIRO for 32 years in Adelaide, Canberra and Perth. Jan was in charge of the Analytical Laboratory in the Division of Land and Water in Perth. She was also a NATA Assessor. On retiring from CSIRO she had her own consulting business undertaking laboratory audits, methodology and sampling techniques for environmental samples. For many years Jan was on the WA Branch and held positions including Analytical Group Chair, Branch President and Chair of the Fellow Committee. She was also Analytical Chemistry Division Chair and Chair of the 12AC/3EC Conference Organising Committee. Jan has been on a number of other external committees as President, Treasurer and Secretary.

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Les Field
National Representative

Professor Les Field (BSc, PhD, DSc, FAA, FRACI) is a graduate of the University of Sydney (BSc 1975; PhD 1979). Following postdoctoral posts at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles (1979-80) and then at Oxford (1981-82), he took up an academic position at the University of Sydney. He was Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Sydney from 1990 to 2005 and Head of the School of Chemistry from 1997 to 2001. He was Associate Dean for Research in the Faculty of Science, Chair of the University Research Committee, Deputy Chair of the Academic Board and Acting Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research). He was appointed as Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of New South Wales in 2005.

He is the author of more than 170 scientific papers and 4 text books. His research interests are in organometallic chemistry (the design of catalysts for the transformation of or organic and non-organic compounds) and in chemical applications of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy. He was the Deputy Director of the successful Cooperative Research Centre for Molecular Engineering and Technology from 1992-1998. He is a Fellow of the RACI and a Fellow of the Australia Academy of Science.

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Joe Shapter
Western Representative

Assoc. Prof. J. Shapter was educated in Canada first completing a BSc(Hons) in chemistry from Memorial University of Newfoundland followed by a PhD from the University of Toronto in 1990 working with Prof. J. C. Polanyi on the detection of small molecules and the determination of their energies. From 1990 to 1996, he worked at the University of Western Ontario (London, Ontario) building a scanning tunnelling microscope and lecturing first year chemistry.
In 1996 he moved to Flinders University and is now an Associate Professor in Chemistry and Nanotechnology. He led the establishment of, and is now course coordinator, for the Flinders Bachelor of Science Degree in Nanotechnology (2000-2003, 2007- present). This was the first degree of its kind in the world. In research, his group works generally in the area of Nanotechnology using various techniques to examine material on the micron or nanometer scale. His group builds phospholipid bilayers on substrates such as mica and uses physical techniques to examine properties and dynamics on the micron scale. Work with chemical attachment of carbon nanotubes to surfaces with both patterned and unpatterned approaches is also an active area of research in his group.
He has been a member of the RACI since his arrival in Australia and has served the RACI in a variety of roles in South Australia including times as both Branch President and Honorary Branch Secretary.

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Peter Lye
North Eastern Representative

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