From optoelectronics to mineral exploration, Dr Cathy Foley has built an enduring legacy of innovations. Now, as Australia’s chief scientist, Foley is on a mission to foster the industries and workforce of tomorrow.
When Dr Cathy Foley was investigating a hitherto overlooked material for her PhD in the 1980s, she had no idea that she was planting seeds that would sprout into a multi-billion dollar industry years later.
The focus of her research was indium nitride, a semiconductor that had attracted scant scientific attention up until that point. Foley’s supervisor, the late physicist Professor Trevor Tansley, had alerted her to the little-known material when she was hunting for a research project to pursue. “It was basically a blank piece of paper as a material, particularly for semiconductor uses,” says Foley.
Their goal was to uncover indium nitride’s potential as a component in light-sensitive devices, which change their electrical properties under different light conditions. Towards the end of her PhD, Foley landed a six-month scholarship as a research fellow in the department of electrical engineering at the State University of Oregon in Corvallis, a bustling centre of innovation and research commercialisation.
In Foley’s mind, she was simply doing great science that led to interesting results and published research papers. But Oregon’s research community saw her research as a potential game-changer in the emerging field of optoelectronics, the study of electronic systems that find, detect and control light. They also exposed Foley to the concept of research commercialisation, an idea that was yet to take root in Australia’s deeply academic research landscape. “I was really surprised when everyone was saying ‘Wow, this is really important work you’re doing’,” says Foley. “I had no idea what they were talking about to be honest … the idea that I could take something and do something with it was not on my agenda at all.”
A decade after Foley and Tansley’s pioneering work, nitride semiconductors began to be used in light-emitting diodes (LEDs). Now, the afterglow of their research shines from devices in almost every industry, including energy, entertainment, aerospace and defence. The optoelectronics industry is slated to be worth almost US$80bn by 2027.
From LEDs to mineral exploration
Foley’s trailblazing work as a student proved to be a sign of things to come. Shortly after completing her PhD at Macquarie University, Foley joined the CSIRO as a national research fellow in 1988. Here, she turned her attention to superconductors, materials that conduct electricity without any resistance.
These highly efficient conductors have made a wide variety of technologies possible, from MRI scanners that peer deep into the human body to particle accelerators that help scientists understand the mysteries of the universe. But Foley and her team wanted to explore how superconductors could be used to detect hard-to-reach minerals buried deep in the ground.
Mineral exploration is challenging at the best of times, but it’s particularly tricky in Australia’s ancient, flat landscape due to its conductive soil layers that sit on top of ore deposits. Known as a conductive overburden, these layers make it difficult for traditional electro-magnetic techniques to distinguish between precious ore deposits and regular soil. “It’s almost like being in a lift and suddenly your mobile phone dies because you’ve got this metal box around you,” says Foley.
To get around this issue, Foley and her team spent over a decade developing highly sensitive magnetic sensors called superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs). These devices use high-temperature superconductors – which can be cooled to a relatively mild temperature of -200°C with liquid nitrogen – to detect magnetic fields that are 100 million times smaller than the Earth’s magnetic field. They are sensitive enough to cut through several layers of conductive soil to find valuable minerals buried deep underground, such as nickel, silver and gold. The jewel in the crown of these devices is that they directly measure the faint magnetic fields emitted by minerals rather than the rate at which their electrical currents decay, as previous techniques did.
This led to the development of CSIRO’s LANDTEM sensor system, which uses SQUIDs to distinguish between regular soil and ore deposits. LANDTEM peers deep into the Earth’s crust and creates three-dimensional maps of underground ore bodies.
While Foley and her team knew their system had the potential to revolutionise mining, it took years to convince the industry that it would work out in the field. “We eventually got there after demonstrating what we could do with field trials and going to exhibitions and conferences to show that you could find deposits you couldn’t find in other ways,” says Foley.
Their efforts eventually paid off. Since 2001, LANDTEM has helped unearth over A$6bn worth of minerals from sites that had not been mined previously across Australia and Canada. While the system has been a boon for the mining industry thanks to its ability to detect new ore bodies, it also offers a more cost-effective approach to mineral exploration. “It was cheaper because, being more sensitive, it meant that you didn’t have to take as many measurements,” says Foley.
Paving the industries of the future
Foley’s knack for turning fundamental science into ground-breaking applications has served her well over her stellar career as a research scientist and leader. In 2018, she climbed the ladder to become CSIRO’s chief scientist, where she championed efforts to translate emerging research into practical outcomes that bring economic benefit.
Now entering her second year as Australia’s chief scientist, Foley’s sights are set on building Australia’s quantum technology sector. Quantum technologies – which exploit the laws of quantum mechanics to solve problems that are near impossible for current technologies – are slated to revolutionise several industries, from healthcare and materials science to finance and logistics. After leading the development of the Quantum Technology Roadmap at CSIRO, Foley is now developing the National Quantum Strategy, which will outline the steps to establish Australia’s quantum industry. By 2040, the quantum industry could add A$4bn to the economy.
In addition to driving forward tomorrow’s industries, Foley acts as a “connector” between the government, industry and research sectors to help shape evidence-based policy and raise awareness of the role science plays in our everyday lives. One silver-lining of the COVID-19 pandemic is that it has shone a light on the importance of scientific expertise, Foley says. She has also noticed that the public have started to grasp scientific concepts that were almost unheard of before the pandemic, from “flattening the curve” to what variants mean for vaccines. “There’s a greater realisation that science advice is there and when you use it, it can really help guide decision-making,” says Foley.
Guiding tomorrow’s STEM workforce
One challenge at the front of Foley’s mind is Australia’s STEM skills shortage. Although 75% of all future jobs will require STEM qualifications and skills, just 6% of Australia’s workforce has a university-level STEM qualification, and women and minority groups still make up a relatively small proportion of that 6%. Part of the problem is school students often struggle to envision what a career in science and technology looks like, says Foley.
It’s a problem Foley herself encountered when she was deciding which career to pursue. Her love of science grew out of studying the fascinating diagrams of gases, liquids, solids and plasmas in her high school textbooks. But her initial idea was to become a schoolteacher as she thought the only pathway into science was to personally know a scientist or be “really smart”. It wasn’t until university that she discovered her passion for research.
“Everyone thinks they know what a doctor or lawyer does, so they can imagine what the job might be like,” she says. “It’s a truism that studying science can lead to a job in a lab at a university – you can be a researcher or a professor. But that is so narrow.”
Foley says that boosting the number of STEM graduates involves building more awareness among high school students and their parents of the range of careers that studying science could lead to, what the pathways are through the university and vocational systems, and how dropping core science subjects early in high school can limit a student’s options down the road. “The opportunities are open and self-fulfilling,” she says. “I want to bring that out into the sunshine and show the community what is possible.”
Article by Gemma Conroy
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