Event Overview
- Friday 12th June 2026
- The University Club of Western Australia, Crawley
- Perth, Western Australia
Data Matters: Virtuous & the Vicious invites leaders from research, industry, government and community to determine how we ensure data continues to underpin rigorous, evidence-based decision-making in an increasingly data-centric world.
Program
8:45AM
welcome
Professor Michael Small
Director, UWA Data Institute
Biography Snapshot
Michael is the Director of the UWA Data Institute and the CSIRO-UWA Chair of Complex Systems. He grew up in Perth and completed a PhD in Applied Mathematics from UWA in 1998. After working in Hong Kong for 12 years he returned to UWA in 2012 upon being awarded an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship. Michael’s research covers the areas of Applied Dynamical Systems and Complex Systems Theory. He works on data-driven applications of mathematics in the real world. He is Chief Investigator on four research centres: Transforming Maintenance through Data Science; Transforming Energy Infrastructure Through Digital Engineering; Transforming Indigenous Mental Health & Wellbeing; and, Electrifying Australia for a Net-zero Future.
Charlie Gunningham
Chair of StartupWA
Biography Snapshot
Charlie has spent more than 25 years in Perth’s innovation ecosystem. He’s been a startup founder, angel investor, media commentator, corporate CEO and university lecturer. Originally from the UK, he worked in Singapore before arriving in Perth in the late 90s. He graduated top of UWA Business School with an MBA and co-founded property listings site aussiehome.com in 1999, which was acquired by REIWA in 2010. He then ran reiwa.com, went on to be CEO of Business News, run Startup News, work for a $485M federal government startup fund and run the WA government’s New Industries Fund programs. He is now Head of Ecosystem Engagement at Meshpoints, on the WA Government’s Innovation Advisory Board, WA Leaders advisory board and is Chair of Startup WA.
8:50AM
Welcome to Country
Alton Walley
Artist & Film Maker
Biography Snapshot
Alton Walley is a Noongar maarm (man) with connection to Whadjuk, Yued, Balardong, Pinjareb, Kineang and Minang areas.
Alton is an artist and a film maker that holds culture and respect at the core of everything he does.
9:00AM
Position Statement
Professor Anna Nowak
Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research, UWA
Biography Snapshot
Professor Anna Nowak is the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Research) at the University of Western Australia, working to deliver research strategy and outcomes across the University. Her previous roles at UWA include Pro Vice Chancellor (Health and Medical Research), Deputy Executive Dean (Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences) and Associate Dean (Research). She is a clinician scientist and Medical Oncologist with research expertise in mesothelioma, neuro-oncology, and tumour immunology.
In addition to her university leadership position, Professor Nowak is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences; a Non-Executive Director of the Cancer Council Western Australia; and serves as an Advisory Council Member for Cancer Australia. She is a member of the Board of the International Mesothelioma Interest Group and is currently President-Elect.
9:10AM
Opening Address
Hon Dr Parwinder Kaur MLC
Member of Legislative Council, WA Government | Scientist | Founder | Chair | Director | Superstar of STEM | TV & Radio Presenter | Australian Sikh Women 2023 | Swan Scientist of the Year 2024 | Achiever of the Year 2024
Biography Snapshot
Hon Dr Parwinder Kaur is an award-winning scientist, advocate, and Member of Parliament, deeply committed to advancing science, community, and inclusive leadership. Her journey from the lab bench to the Western Australian Legislative Council—as a first-generation migrant, mother, and woman of colour—reflects her passion for innovation and transformative change. Elected in May 2025 as a Member of the Legislative Council for the Australian Labor Party, she brings a powerful voice for progress and inclusion.
Dr Kaur has received numerous accolades for her sustained contributions to science. Drawing on her expertise in biotechnology, she connects people with their environments in new and meaningful ways. Recognised with prestigious honours—including the Australian Academy of Sciences’ Science and Innovation Award (2013), Microsoft’s AI for Earth Award (2019), and induction into the Western Australia Women’s Hall of Fame (2023)—she champions diversity in STEM and evidence-based policy. She empowers people from all walks of life and age groups to see that individuals can drive change. As a Member of Parliament, professor of science, and mother, Dr Kaur stands as an inspiring role model for the next generation of diverse scientists to pursue their passion for discovery, translation, and public service.
In her role as Deputy Chair of Committees, member of the Standing Committee on Environment and Public Affairs, and Member of the National Policy Forum of the Australian Labor Party, she continues to demonstrate her belief that science and service together can create a sustainable, equitable future for all.
9:20AM
Why Data Matters
Expert Reel
Professor Fiona Wood AO
Plastic & Reconstructive Surgeon & Researcher, Director Fiona Wood Foundation
Biography Snapshot
Professor Fiona Wood is a Plastic and Reconstructive surgeon who has dedicated her life to the treatment of those suffering from burn injury and ensuring that the quality of the scar outcome is worth the pain of survival. Prof Wood has translated into clinical practise a number of initiatives from injury prevention, first aid and pre-hospital care, to the improvements in the care related to infection control, pain relief, fluid resuscitation, wound healing, surgical intervention and scar management. Prof Wood developed and commercialised a cell therapy for burns and has been widely recognised for her achievements in the community (Australian of the Year 2005), in Industry (Clunies Ross award for innovation) and by her peers (Fellowship of King’s College London). Prof Wood has been the Director of the Burns Service of Western Australia (BSWA) since 1991. She was the 2005 Australian of the year and the 2022 ASMR medallist.
Spotlight
“We are at the forefront of global research and discovery in the area of burns. By continually growing the body of knowledge in the field, our work will save lives and make a significant difference to the recovery of people who have sustained burn injuries both locally and around the world.”
9:30AM
Keynote Speaker
From Data to Impact: Adoption of AI and Data-Driven Innovation
Professor Eun Jung Holden
Professor of Digital Innovation School of Computing and Information Systems, University of Melbourne
Biography Snapshot
Professor Eun-Jung Holden is from the School of Computing and Information Systems at The University of Melbourne, where she holds a position as Professor of Digital Innovation. She has leading expertise in developing innovative and trustworthy AI solutions for the resource industry. Her research applies machine learning, image analysis, data mining and natural language processing, and human-in-the-loop processes to support data-to-knowledge transformation in industry and academic projects.
She was trained as a computer scientist at The University of Western Australia, where her postgraduate and postdoctoral research focused on developing computer vision and visualisation algorithms for human gesture recognition. In 2006, she made a transition to geoscience and established Centre for Data-driven Geoscience at UWA. Prior to joining The University of Melbourne, Professor Holden was the Founding Director of the UWA Data Institute, bringing together 13 research clusters to build a gateway to the data-intensive industries in Western Australia in 2021. She is a strong advocate for end-user-focused research, and an active educator in preparing industry-ready students in innovation and technopreneurship.
10:20AM
MORNING TEA
10:40AM
Keynote Speaker
The Shortest History of AI: A light-hearted look at the long history of artificial intelligence.
Professor Toby Walsh
Chief Scientist UNSW, Laureate Fellow, Author
Biography Snapshot
He was Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, and of AI Communications. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of the ACM, Journal of Automated Reasoning and the Constraints journal. He has been elected a fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, and the European Coordinating Committee for AI in recognition of his research in artificial intelligence and service to the community. He has won the NSW Premier’s Prize for Excellence in Engineering and ICT, the Humbolt Award, the Research Excellence Award of the Association for Constraint Programming and the .IJCAI Donald E. Walker Distinguished Service Award. He has been Secretary of the Association for Constraint Programming (ACP) and is Editor of CP News, the newsletter of the ACP. He is one of the Editors of the Handbook for Constraint Programming, and the Handbook for Satisfiability.
He has been Program and Conference Chair of the main conferences in Constraint Programming, Automated Reasoning and Artificial Intelligence
Author Highlight
The Shortest History of AI traces this evolution, from Ada Lovelace’s visionary work to IBM’s groundbreaking defeat of the chess world champion and the revolutionary emergence of ChatGPT.
11:30AM
Keynote Speakers
Challenges & Opportunities Designing Therapeutic mRNAs, Relying on Natural & Synthetic Data
Professor Archa Fox
School of Human Sciences, Australian Centre for RNA Therapeutics in Cancer
Biography Snapshot
Archa Fox is Professor in the School of Human Sciences and the School of Molecular Sciences at the University of Western Australia, and an affiliate investigator with the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research.
Archa studied her Bachelor of Science at the University of New South Wales, majoring in molecular genetics. She went on to study her PhD at the University of Sydney (awarded in the year 2000) and carried out her postdoctoral research in Dundee, Scotland. There she learnt to combine cell biology and microscopy with molecular biology. In 2006, she started her own research group at the Western Australian Institute for Medical Research, now known as the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research. In 2015 she took up an academic position at the University of WA. She has been the recipient of the Marshall Medal of the Harry Perkins Institute in 2012, and the emerging leader award of the Australian/NZ Society of Cell and Developmental Biology in 2017. In 2020/21 she was a Director of the International RNA Society and has been the Chair of the RNA Network of Australia since 2015.
Dr. Nikolay Shirokikh
School of Human Sciences, Head of the RNA Multi-Omics and Design Lab
Biography Snapshot
From 1997-2003 Nikolay Shirokikh studied Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (Moscow, Russia). In 2004, he worked on the mechanisms defining start codon selection fidelity during his postgraduate internship in the laboratory of Profs Pestova and Hellen (State University of New York, Brooklyn, NY, USA). In 2011, he completed his PhD in the laboratory of Prof Spirin (Institute of Protein Research, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pushchino, Moscow Region, Russia), where he investigated unusual properties of viral mRNA leaders that define their ability to ‘hijack’ ribosomes and overtake the host protein synthesis.
In 2012, he was awarded Go8 European Fellowship (The Group of Eight Universities, Australia) to collaborate with the RNA Biology Laboratory headed by Prof Preiss for an innovative project on the mechanisms of eukaryotic translation initiation. From 2015, he worked in the Preiss group where he primarily used high-throughput sequencing methods to explore functions of eukaryotic RNA in live cells. Together with Prof Preiss and Dr Archer, he has created an approach allowing to dissect all translation control in vivo (translation complex profile sequencing, TCP-seq).
In 2019, Nikolay Shirokikh was awarded an NHMRC Emerging Leadership Investigator Grant to expand the research of rapid translational control in the areas of cell stress response and cancer biology.
12:10PM
Fireside Chat
Dr. Jo Hawkins
Director of Research Translation & Chief Operating Officer at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR)
Biography Snapshot
Jo is a deep tech enthusiast with a passion for translating innovative ideas into real-world solutions. She has 20+ years of experience in strategy, innovation and business development in global companies. Jo is currently the Director of Research Translation and Chief Operating Officer at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR). Jo has extensive experience developing deep science and technology from IP to startup and commercialisation as an advisor, strategist, and ecosystem builder. She is skilled at connecting stakeholders from different backgrounds, speaking the language of startups, industry, universities, and government – and helping them understand each other’s perspectives. Jo is also a non-executive Director of Startup WA, a non-profit entity that advances the startup industry in Western Australia through representation, advocacy, and public policy. In 2021, she was recognised as one of Western Australia’s 40 under 40 business leaders.
Dr. Michael Bertolacci
School of Physics,
Mathematics and Computing, UWA
Biography Snapshot
I am interested in large scale spatio-temporal problems in environmental statistics.
Martin Kirk
General Manager Digital - Australia Chevron
Biography Snapshot
Martin brings deep expertise in driving digital transformation across Chevron’s full value chain, with a strong track record in digital strategy and implementation.
1:00PM
LUNCH
2:00PM
Post-graduate Student Researcher Pitch
Dr. Jake Kendrick (MC)
School of Physics,
Mathematics and Computing, UWA
Biography Snapshot
Jake Kendrick’s research centres on the application of artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computational methods to medical imaging, with the goal of improving precision medicine and patient outcomes. He develops and evaluates deep learning algorithms for the automated detection, segmentation, and classification of cancer on molecular imaging modalities such as PSMA PET. His work integrates radiomics and imaging biomarkers, extracting quantitative features from scans that carry diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive value. By linking these biomarkers with clinical and treatment data, Jake’s research aims to provide clinicians with robust tools for patient stratification, therapy selection, and outcome monitoring. His projects span from investigating tumour biology with AI-derived metrics to assessing repeatability, reliability, and clinical utility of imaging biomarkers in multi-centre settings.
Research with Impact
A showcase of inspiring student research from across UWA
Matthew Aquilina
School of Physics, Mathematics and Computing, Department of Physics (Medical Physics)
Reliable FET-PET Features for Machine Learning in the Treatment of Glioblastoma
Ziyuan Ding
Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, The Australian Centre for RNA Therapeutics in Cancer (ACRTC)
How Foundation Models Help RNA Design and How We Can Evaluate and Improve Them?
Parmida Ghorbanian
School of Engineering, OBEL Lab, Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research
More than meets the eye: AI-powered heart risk detection using retinal images
Daniel Hess
School of Earth and Oceans, Centre for Data-driven Geoscience
Assisted Resource Prediction in Low-Volume Domains using Image-to-Image Translation
Junhe Qiao
School of Physics, Mathematics and Computing, Department of Mathematics & Statistics
Data in Motion: The Hidden Rules Behind Flocks, Crowds, and Decisions
Yini Sheng
Business School
Beyond the map: Measuring how older adults really access healthcare
Shriprabha (Shri) Upadhyaya
School of Biological Sciences
Uncovering the genetic control of crop yield using machine learning
2:30PM
Industry Speaker
Virtuous Moats, Vicious Pitfalls: What Makes Data Investable
Pia Turcinov AM
(Portfolio Non-Exec Director (ASX:BRN), Fund WA VC & Tech Investor, Diversity Equity Inclusion Champion, Pearcey WA Entrepreneur of the Year 2023, WITWA Ambassador)
Biography Snapshot
Pia manages a portfolio career, holding a number of positions that are connected through a common focus on the opportunities which innovation, technology, and diversification offer. Her experience is a result of 30+ years across the private, not-for-profit, and government sectors. Commencing her career as a corporate lawyer in Sydney, NSW, she later practised commercial law in Perth, Western Australia. Evolving from legal advisor to commercial director, she held senior positions within industry, provided leadership and governance as a company director across a range of businesses, and facilitated innovation through a number of State and Federal Government initiatives. She is a committed and active protagonist within the Australian innovation ecosystem, with a passion for entrepreneurship, disruption, and connecting Australian smarts to the world. Pia continues to share her expertise as an advisor and mentor and as a keynote speaker on topics relating to tech, commercialisation innovation, and STEM. As the mother of three adult children, she remains a committed champion for diversity, equity, and enabling women as innovators, leaders, and entrepreneurs. In 2018 Pia was awarded the Excellence in Gender Equity Promotion Award by the United Nations Association of Australia (WA Division) Inc, and in June 2023 was appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia in the King’s Birthday 2023 Honours List for significant service to technology and innovation, and to women in STEM.
3:00pM
Industry Speaker
Tamryn Barker
Sector Director, Mining and Nature Tech Founders WA
Biography Snapshot
Tamryn is dedicated to building a global community of leading innovators from Western Australia, to create the solutions, capability and culture we need into the future. She co-founded CORE Innovation Hub, Australia’s first tech hub network for resources and energy innovation.
Currently, she leads CORE’s role as activator and operator of the Australian Automation and Robotics Precinct in Perth, a WA Government project to create Australia’s largest industrial testing grounds. In this “Dirt Lab”, she passionately supports local and global founders, innovators, researchers and industry test, develop and implement advanced autonomous, robotic, remote operations and zero emissions technologies. Recently, she was appointed by Federal Minister Husic to the Industry Growth Program evaluation committee for funding innovative Australian startups and SMEs.
3:30PM
Awards
Post Graduate Student Researcher Pitch
A prize will be presented to the most outstanding pitch, recognising excellence in student research communication and innovation.
UWA Data Institute Research Awards 2026
Presentation of awards to the winners of the inaugural UWA Data Institute Research Awards across four categories.
3:50PM
Close
Professor Michael Small
Director, UWA Data Institute
Biography Snapshot
I am interested in complex systems and how understanding of complexity can help solve real engineering and social problems. My undergraduate degree was in pure mathematics (with an honours dissertation in the history of mathematics) and my graduate degree was in applied mathematics (in nonlinear dynamical systems and nonlinear time series analysis). From 2001 I worked as a researcher and lecturer in the Electronic and Information Engineering Department of Hong Kong Polytechnic University. In 2011, I was awarded a professorial Future Fellowship from the Australian Research Council and took up a position with the School of Mathematics and Statistics, at UWA.
Since 2016 I have held the CSIRO-UWA Chair in Complex Systems and have appointments at both UWA (Faculty of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences) and CSIRO (Mineral Resources). I am the current Director of the UWA Data Institute. I am Chief Investigator of the Australian Research Council Industrial Transformation Training Centre for Transforming Maintenance through Data Science, and of the Australian Research Council Industrial Transformation Research Hub for Transforming Energy Infrastructure Through Digital Engineering. I lead the Complex Systems Group at UWA.
My academic duties include the position of Editor-in-Chief of the journal Chaos (the leading journal within my discipline) and Main Editor of the journal Physica A.
My research is focussed on fundamental advances and applications in the area of complex systems and dynamical systems theory.
4:00-5:00PM
Networking & Refreshments
Get in Touch
Our door is open for collaboration opportunities, membership enquiries and everything data science, machine learning, language models and AI. We encourage you to reach out to the team at the UWA Data Institute.