Australian elected Fellow of the Royal Society

The CSIRO’s Dr Ezio Rizzardo has been elected as a Fellow of Britain’s Royal Society for his work in the area of polymers. This year celebrating its 350th anniversary, the Royal Society boasts some of history’s most influential minds among its alumni, including Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin and Stephen Hawking. “Being a [ Royal Society ] fellow means that the rest of the world believes I’ve actually made exceptional contributions to science which is very gratifying,” Dr Rizzardo said. He is one of just 44 people from around the world who will be inducted into the Royal Society in a ceremony in London in mid-July. Dr Rizzardo and his team have given to the world numerous new approaches for producing better and new types of polymers, with applications for anything from adhesives, cosmetics, membranes for water purification, plastic solar cells and intelligent drug discovery. Dr Rizzardo has won numerous Australian prizes for his work, and is the co-author of some 180 journal papers, which to date have received over 8,000 citations, and 31 worldwide patent families. To date some 60 multinational companies have acknowledged more than 500 patents that are dependent on CSIRO polymer inventions. Over the next few years it is hoped that these polymer patents will lead to a rich new revenue stream for the CSIRO and its researchers. “The [ CSIRO polymer ] work is having quite a bit of impact,” Dr Rizzardo said.