Australia's most prestigious award for excellence in science to Graeme Jameson

More good news on Australian awards, Paul Cleary a few days ago, Sandy Gray last week, and now the great news that Prof. Graeme Jameson, of the University of Newcastle, Australia, has received this year’s inaugural A$250,000 Prime Minister's Prize for Innovation. The Prime Minister's Prizes for Science are Australia’s most prestigious and highly regarded awards for excellence in scientific research, innovation and science teaching.The Prize was presented last night by the Australian Prime Minister, the Hon Malcolm Turnbull, at a dinner in the Great Hall at Parliament House, Canberra.

Graeme Jameson with his award in Canberra

Graeme was one of six prize winners for science in 2015 and he received the prize for "how trillions of bubbles earned billions for Australia". This refers, of course, to the well known Jameson Cell, considered by many to be the nation's biggest export earner in the last 25 years. With well over 300 cells now in operation across 25 countries, the Cell is being used for copper, coal, zinc, nickel, lead, silver and platinum extraction world-wide. 

Prof. Jameson' research continues to push the boundaries and he is currently working on the Novacell, a Fluidised Bed Flotation Cell that has the potential to make massive reductions in the energy used in the minerals industry. The device will increase the upper particle size limit of flotation and drastically reduce the mining industry's energy and water consumption. He will be presenting a paper on coarse particle flotation in fluidised beds in 4 weeks' time at Flotation '15 in Cape Town.

I have known Graeme Jameson for several years. He has presented research papers at all MEI’s Flotation conferences and was a keynote lecturer at Flotation ’09. He is a long-standing member of the Editorial Board of Minerals Engineering and is the recipient of many major awards. I was pleased to nominate him for International Mining’s Hall of Fame, into which he was inaugurated in 2014. In 2013 he was awarded the SME’s prestigious Antoine Gaudin Award in Denver.

Graeme with Barbara and me in Santiago-Chile, 2014

In 2005 he was recognised in the Australian Queen's Birthday honours list, being made Officer of the Order of Australia, "for service to engineering, science, industry and the environment as an inventor and through contributions in the fields of fluid and particle mechanics, mineral processing, water and wastewater treatment and particle technology.” In the same year he was made Laureate Professor of the University of Newcastle, Australia, recognising his many contributions to research and his international standing in the field. He was the first person to receive the award, which is reserved only for a small number of outstanding researchers. He remains the Director of the Centre for Multiphase Processes in the University. Other accolades include the CSIRO Medal and being recognised as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences, the Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences.

We at MEI feel honoured to have such a good association with Prof. Jameson and his work.