Thank you Ms Harvey and good afternoon ladies and gentlemen.
Firstly, I would like to respectfully acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians of the land on which we meet today, and pay my respect to their elders past, present and future.
And, I would like to extend that respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People present today.
I would also like to acknowledge:
• Professor Margaret Sheil AO, Vice-Chancellor and President, Queensland University of Technology
• Professor Dietmar Hutmacher, Director of the ARC Training Centre in Additive Biomanufacturing
• Professor Gordon Wallace, ARC Australian Laureate Fellow and Chief Investigator, ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre in Additive Biomanufacturing, University of Wollongong
• Professor Lyn Griffiths, Executive Director, Institute of Health Biomedical Innovation, Queensland University of Technology
• Professor Peter Choong, Chief Investigator, ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre in Additive Biomanufacturing, The University of Melbourne
• Staff, researchers and students of the Queensland University of Technology.
• Industry partners
• Representatives from partner Iniversities
It gives me great pleasure to be here today for the launch of the ARC Training Centre in Additive Biomanufacturing .
I am here representing Senator the Hon. Simon Birmingham, Minister for Education and Training, who sends his sincere apologies that he cannot be here today.
This ARC Training Centre represents a new frontier in an ongoing revolution that is affecting both manufacturing and medicine.
Rapid advances in fabrication technologies are leading to personalised biomedical applications, with clinical applications to help surgeons treat a range of difficult problems, from bone defects to deafness.
This is a rapidly emerging multidisciplinary field, which promises to translate into significant commercial opportunities for Australian based researchers and their industry partners.
With funding of over $3.7 million over four years, through the ARC’s Industrial Transformation Training Centres scheme, this Training Centre is uniting researchers and industry to develop and translate several key technology platforms for personalised treatments of challenging medical conditions.
The research conducted at this new Training Centre will lead to specific synergistic and innovative technologies needed for the personalised therapies of the future.
These include modular additive biomanufacturing platforms; advanced bio-inks for regenerative medicine; and additive manufactured tools for surgical planning and education.
This new Training Centre has placed itself at the centre of a co-ordinated research training program that unites the Queensland University of Technology, the University of Wollongong; RMIT University; Deakin University and The University of Melbourne.
It has also drawn substantial cash and in-kind support from its industry partner organisations, whose strategic priorities align well with this Training Centre—these organisations are:
• Cochlear Limited
• The Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre
• St Vincent's Health
• Osteopore International Pty Ltd
• The Shanghai Institute of Ceramics
• Anatomics Pty Ltd.
Together, these partner organisations are investing significant resources into your Training Centre, which will ensure that they are positioned to become world leaders in the commercialisation of additive biomanufacturing.
Professor Dietmar Hutmacher has been recognised by the European Society of Biomaterials as a pioneer in the field of biomaterials, and in taking fundamental research in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine through to clinical applications .
He is also clearly a research leader, having built this multidisciplinary research team including exceptional post-doctoral fellows and doctoral students from the fields of engineering, cell biology, polymer chemistry, as well as clinicians, and veterinary surgeons.
I congratulate everyone involved in establishing the ARC Training Centre in Additive Biomanufacturing.
Today we celebrate the launch of your Training Centre, which has united university researchers and industry.
It gives me great pleasure to officially launch your Training Centre. I look forward to seeing the outcomes of your research endeavours.
Thank you.