Welcome

I am the Editor-in-Chief of COSMOS, the Australian science magazine I co-founded.

I’ve served as president of the World Federation of Science Journalists, and been the winner of 31 journalism and film awards. Among them were two Editor of the Year trophies for my work on COSMOS, and one of Australia’s ‘Oscars’: the AFI Award for Best Documentary for The Diplomat, a film about East Timor’s 24-year struggle for freedom, centred on the Nobel Peace laureate (and now president), José Ramos Horta.

COSMOS itself has won 45 awards, including two Magazine of the Year trophies and a smattering of international accolades, among them the American Institute of Physics Science Writing Award and the Reuters/IUCN Award for Excellence in Environmental Journalism.

Formerly a science reporter for Australia’s public broadcaster, ABC TV, I’ve also been a foreign correspondent for the global newswire Reuters – working in Canada, the USA, Indonesia and Australia – and was a science editor for Australia’s highest-rating news site, ABC Online.

I began my career as a staff journalist on The Sydney Morning Herald and later became a technology writer for The Age, the two oldest broadsheet metropolitan newspapers in Australia. I’ve also been the Sydney correspondent for Britain’s New Scientist, was a founding editor of the science magazines Newton and Science Spectra, and managing editor of 21C, the innovative futures magazine.

I do a lot of public speaking, and have made hundreds of appearances on TV and radio – on topics ranging from climate change and bird flu to space travel and the future of energy – including on the Today Show, Sunrise and The Science Show in Australia, The Agenda with Steve Paikin in Canada, the BBC in Britain and TV Globo in Brazil.

Among the dozens of conferences I’ve spoken at are the UNESCO World Science Forum in Budapest, the EuroScience Forum in Munich and the Science and Technology in Society Forum in Kyoto.

I hope to become one of Australia’s first private astronauts when I fly aboard a Virgin Galactic rocket into space in 2012. This has tended to attract media interest, and consequently I’ve been profiled in The Conversation Hour with Richard Fidler and In Conversation with Robyn Williams, both on ABC Radio, and was featured in GoodWeekend magazine’s popular ‘Two of Us’ profile (with Dr Alan Finkel).

I’ve donated time and effort to many science communication, education and arts projects over the years. A co-founder of Science in the Pub and of the Talking Science community radio program, I’ve served six years as a councillor and then president of The Australian Museum Society; six years as a board member, vice-president and then president of the the Australian Science Communicators; two terms on the management committee of the Australian Society of Authors; as a judge of the Eureka Awards for Science Journalism; and as a member of the Federal Department of Innovation, Industry, Science & Research’s Science & Media Expert Working Group. Under my leadership as president, the World Federation of Science Journalists grew from a virtual group into a global organisation with a US$2.1 million program which trained 60 science journalists in Africa and the Middle East.

I am passionate about science, the environment and the role of journalism in a civil society, and believe that with determination and ingenuity we can solve many of the world’s most pressing problems.