Physics Guest Speaker

Women in Physics Lectures 2021

Radiation protection of astronauts in human missions to Mars: simulation and reality.

The school was very fortunate to have associative professor Susanna Guatelli speak to our some of our Year 10, 11 and 12 physics students about her work in protecting astronauts in human missions to Mars.

Susanna trained as a nuclear physicist at the University of Genova, Italy.  In 2003 she had the opportunity to undertake a PhD in physics, based at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).  Her enthusiasm for medical physics drove her to study possible radiation protection solutions for human mission to Mars (a project led by the European Space Agency) as her PhD research topic.  In 2007 she moved to Australia and since 2009 she has been an academic at the School of Physics, University of Wollongong where she is the academic director of the Medical Radiation Physics Bachelor Degree. She is an internationally recognised expert of Monte Carlo simulations for medical applications, including radiation protection of astronauts.

The talk was fascinating and well received by our physics students. The students asked thought provoking questions relevant to her research. Susanna was a great inspiration to students to think about studying radiation physics in the future.