MACSYS Joins Mentorloop
MACSYS is pleased to announce the Centre has officially joined the ARC Centre of Excellence Mentorloop Program.
Mentorloop will allow you to connect and learn from not only members within MACSYS, but also members from other ARC Centres of Excellence, including SynBio and QUBIC.
For potential mentees: this is a great opportunity to connect with a mentor who can offer insight, advice, opportunities, and help you navigate the next stage(s) of your career
For potential mentors: you can use this to give back, become a better leader, and refine your own skills and networks
You should have received two emails last week. The first announced the program with links on how to learn more and register. The second email came directly from Mentorloop. All the information you need is in those emails, including important dates. Also, we plan to hold a webinar soon to answer any questions you might have.
MACSYS Wikipedia Edit-a-thon
To celebrate the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, the MACSYS Equity, People, and Culture Committee (EPPC) is running a Wikipedia edit-a-thon focused on improving and creating Wikipedia pages about women in STEM.
Currently, only 20% of biographies on Wikipedia are about women. This is a practical way to help close that gap, while also learning a useful skill: writing clearly for a broad audience using independent sources.
WHEN: Weds, 11 February
9:30 am - 11 am AEDT / 8:30 am - 10 am AEST
FORMAT: This will be a morning tea / coffee / brekkie-style session. Everyone can participate on Zoom, but we encourage each node to meet in person if you have a critical mass. More on the meeting groups later.
TO PARTICIPATE: Enrol via the event page here
You can work on:
Improving existing Wikipedia pages (adding references, clarity, structure),
Drafting a brand new biography page for someone notable who doesn’t yet have one.
Before you come (optional but helpful)
Bring an idea of a woman in STEM you’d like to improve/create a page for - or choose from the “Women in Red” lists linked on the Dashboard event page.
Participants of all genders and career stages are welcome (staff, postgrads, undergrads).
30-minute Workshop on Optimising your LinkedIn Profile Page
Tim Macuga (MACSYS Comms & Media) is going to run a short workshop on making sure your LinkedIn profile page is doing what you want it to.
When: Weds, 4 Feb
Time: 12 pm AEDT/11 am AEST
Did you know that LinkedIn is often the first place people go to online to look up who you are and what you’re working on? This may be before a meeting, before seeing you speak, or simply because they’ve heard about you.
Secondly, many people set up a LinkedIn profile and then never take a few extra minutes to optimise it. But those few minutes can make a real difference and help your profile stand out from the overwhelming majority on the platform.
This workshop ISN’T about posting content or being active on LinkedIn. Instead, it’s simply about making sure your profile page accurately and confidently reflects who you are - so that when someone searches your name, you know you’re putting your best foot forward.
We are in the final stages of preparing the MACSYS 2025 Annual Report and ARC KPI submission, and we urgently need your help to close remaining data gaps.
If you haven’t submitted all your 2025 activities, now is the time.
Please ensure you have entered any remaining items in these categories:
Datasets and code (GitHub, GitLab, etc.)
Pre-prints (arXiv, bioRxiv, etc.)
Presentations and talks (invited/plenary talks, seminars, conference presentations, public talks)
Travel and conferences attended (all travel, regardless of funding source)
External visitors hosted at your Node (regardless of funding source)
Grants and other income (non‑ARC grants, industry income, consultancies, etc.)
How to submit
All reporting is done through the MACSYS SharePoint site.
Each page shows your existing entries and includes clear buttons to add or edit submissions.
Please act now
To keep the Annual Report on schedule, we ask all members to submit any remaining data as soon as possible.
The Professional Staff team will also reach out shortly to confirm theme affiliation and follow up on any outstanding items.
Need help?
If you have trouble accessing SharePoint or need assistance entering information, please contact your Node Administrator.
Welcome to MACSYS!
Kate Moxhay takes over as the new Node Administrator for Melbourne. Kate studied Social Anthropology at Birkbeck, University of London. She has previously worked in book publishing, finance, and travel writing. She has been at The University of Melbourne since 2023.
Dr Francesca Short is an Associate Investigator working on regulatory networks and environmental survival in bacterial pathogens. Fran joined Monash University in November 2020 as an ARC DECRA fellow and became a teaching and research academic in 2023. Fran’s research bridges classical molecular microbiology, biochemistry and genomics approaches to build our understanding of how bacterial pathogens adapt and survive, with a particular focus on the regulation of virulence factors, and survival of stresses encountered outside the host, such as disinfectants.
Rebecca Li giving presentation on her PhD research
Tracking our PhD students
Congratulations to PhD student Rebecca Li for recently completing her Confirmation of Candidature presentation at The University of Melbourne.
Rebecca’s project is titled, “A Kinetic Model of Central Carbon Metabolism for Studying Overflow Metabolism.” Her supervisors are Professor Jen Flegg (Melbourne) and Dr Michael Pan (UNSW).
For your planning purposes, here are some upcoming MACSYS Meetings of interest.
All Research Fellow Forum - Monday, 9 March - 11 am - 1 pm AEDT
All Students Forum - Monday, 13 April - 11 am - 1 pm AEST
All CI Meeting - Monday, 27 April - 2 pm - 4 pm AEST
Meeting invites will go out to the different groups in the near future.
