Node 7: Biomedical and Industrial Technologies

A key focus of XENQ is to support the development of biomedical and industrial technologies relying on a detailed knowledge of the structure and conformation of matter. The Network will bring together theoreticians and experimentalists, typically physicists and chemists, at the forefront of the development of new techniques, and will bring them in contact with researchers, mostly working in other disciplines such as engineering and biosciences, who might exploit these techniques for the national benefit. Many of the network members will be involved in this Node, either as contributors or as active users. McInnes, Ryan, Varghese, Brugger, Kimpton, Hay, Wright, Leckey, Riley and others are particularly active in these issues.

The potential benefits of these synergies to Australian industry are immense. Australia is positioning itself as a world leader in rational drug design, an emerging technology that depends critically on state-of-the-art methods in materials structure determination. Local researchers are recognized experts in this field, and have driven the development of new experimental and analytical techniques that will make important contributions to Australia's research priorities.

Key application areas in which the XENQ Network's partnership between theoreticians and experimentalists may hope to make important contributions are: