Let's Share Your Story ...

Rami wears a few hats at Space Australia (Founding Director and Editor) and is located in Sydney - covering stories across the city and NSW. 

He often spends his weekends hanging out with his little doggo mate, Max (Jack Russell), and is passionate about pulsars, gravitational waves, and supermassive black holes (from an astrophysics perspective) - but also loves supporting diversity, citizen science, and Mexican food. 

When travelling, Rami prefers the more remote, mountain regions, having climbed the summit of Kilimanjaro and been to Everest base camp. 

Rami is nearing the end of his PhD in Astrophysics at Macquarie University, is a Board Member of the Australian Queers in Science committee, and is a passionate science communicator. He comes from a business/digital background of building websites, apps, social media etc. for several agencies across NSW Government for over 5 years, and beyond that a history in the digital space from the mid-2000s.

Email: rami@spaceaustralia.com

BlueSky: @CosmicRami

Vanessa is located in Perth, and is one of our SpaceAus Reporters. They cover stories across Western Australia.

Inspired by a mixture of science fiction and scientific curiosity, Vanessa is passionate about the potential of human exploration and settlement in space and on other planets. They like to hang out with their cat, Kandi, and you can guarantee that if Vanessa has free time, they will be knitting. They also enjoys trips to local bakeries, cafés, and markets on weekends.

Vanessa is a graduate from the University of Southern Queensland, with undergraduate degrees in archaeology, anthropology, and physics. Vanessa also hopes to one day undertake research in anthropology of outer space.

Twitter: @astronessie1

Vi is a SpaceAus Reporter based in South Australia, covering stories from across the state, in addition to being an aspiring space doctor studying the medicine at the University of Adelaide. In 2018, she was a recipient of the Australasian Society of Aerospace Medicine (ASAM) John Lane Trust Scholarship for her literature review on infectious diseases in space and is currently undertaking an Honours project in the area of post-spaceflight rehabilitation of the musculoskeletal system.

Vi is an alumnus and class representative of the International Space University Southern Hemisphere Space Studies Program (ISU SH-SSP) class of 2020. Vi is also a proud graduate of South Australian Space School and National Space Camp. Outside of her studies, Vi is a long-distance runner, creative writer and an environmental advocate.  Her favourite movie is 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Twitter: @vistronaut

Dan is located in Melbourne, and as a SpaceAus Reporter he covers stories and events from Victoria and Tasmania.

A few years ago Dan decided that being an airline pilot with a young family and a hyperactive Havanese dog were not enough to keep him busy so he decided to explore a passion that he'd had since childhood and study Astronomy. He's not looked back since, and loves doing research and communicating science to young people and adults.

On his days off he can sometimes be found in a nerdy space t-shirt with his model rockets talking to school students about STEM. Dan started in IT and looks for opportunities to apply his coding skills to problems in aerospace. His leisure time is spent playing Kerbal Space Program and Elite: Dangerous, and trying to figure out the most efficient way to destroy the solar system using the n-body physics in Universe Sandbox.

He also likes hiking and travelling, and spending time watching rocket launches with his kids.

Twitter: @dhlambeth

Kim is located in Sydney and is one of our SpaceAus Reporters covering equality, STEM and education activities. She has spent much of her career bridging the gap between the technical and the human. For the past several years, she produced websites and digital applications focused on user-centred design for NSW government. Before moving to website production, Kim was a Technical Writer, web writer and editor, and a freelance music writer. Kim has just completed her Graduate Certificate in Cyber Security and has also returned to her love of writing. 

Kim is fascinated with Indigenous Australian astronomy and the future of the Australian Space industry in Australia as well as having a special interest in STEM for girls. 

When she’s not researching ransomware and data breaches, Kim enjoys writing for children, photography and has taken way too many photos of her English Springer Spaniel.

Twitter: @kimgosscha

Ruth is based in Brisbane and is one our SpaceAus reporters covering Queensland and Northern Territories.

Ruth is an enthusiastic advocate for diversity, particularly within STEM fields. She is currently studying for a master’s in space operations at UNSW, having completed a Grad Cert during 2020. She also holds a bachelor’s in aerospace engineering and has more than 15 years’ experience connecting and supporting people within recruitment and career coaching.

Ruth is inspired by the people behind the technology and how technology can be used to the betterment of humanity. She is also passionate about ensuring diverse voices are heard in STEM so that the world can be designed and engineered with everyone in mind.

Ruth is also a massive fan of LEGO, using LEGO to not only support her drive to support diversity and inclusion but also her passion for Space and Technology. Her Saturn V and Shuttle LEGO models are the centrepieces of her varied collection.

BlueSky: @RocketWoman

Clare is one of our SpaceAus Reporters located in Sydney. They cover stories across New South Wales, as well as anything about Mars and inspiring future generations. Clare is a PhD Candidate in the Australian Centre for Astrobiology. Their PhD
topic is Exogeoconservation of Mars, with a particular focus on sites of astrobiological significance and planetary evolution significance.

Clare enjoys learning about space law and policy and its applications to exogeoconservation. Clare recently completed an MPhil creating a roadmap towards conserving the Pilbara Early Life Sites which are the oldest convincing evidence of life on Earth. These sites are used by NASA and the European Space Agency to train rover science mission teams, most recently for the Perseverance mission to spot evidence of life on Mars.

Clare has always had an interest in space, wanting to be an astronaut as a kid and an astrochemist in high school. Though none of these careers are ever off the table for them. When not working on their thesis, Clare likes to use their creative energy to
paint, draw, cross stitch, or cook. Clare is a big believer in creativity enhancing science by ensuring you are always thinking outside the box and pushing the boundaries of current knowledge and methods. Clare is also passionate about good science communication, particularly for school kids as well as inclusivity and diversity in STEM fields.

Email: clare.fletcher@unsw.edu.au

Twitter: @clarefletcher42

Kovi is a SpaceAus reporter based in Sydney who covers stories about space, astrophysics, and STEM.

Having noticed the growing trends of anti-intellectualism and science denial, Kovi developed a passion for science communication and outreach. Through his social media platform, he has collaborated with science communicators and educators on a number of events and SciComm campaigns; centred around topics like women in STEM, astronomy and the accessibility of science.

During his BSc (Physics) at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Kovi was a research assistant on an observational astrophysics team that used radio telescopes to study supernovae and other interesting astronomical transients. Now at the University of Sydney searching for new astronomical radio sources, Kovi is currently pursuing his PhD in Astrophysics and continues exploring the Universe.

A strong proponent of science, education, mindfulness and snacks, most of Kovi’s days are spent coding, reading, stargazing, or making memes about doing one of the three.

BlueSky: @FunFactScience

Dr. Kirsten Banks is our resident SpaceAus TikToker, based in Sydney, who creates quick and fun bites of SpaceAus video content. From a very young age, Kirsten was fascinated by the sky, dreaming of becoming a meteorologist in Primary School and moving from the clouds to the stars in High School. She loves to share her passion for space and astronomy with anyone and everyone.

Whenever she’s not working on her research, she’s creating fun science and space content to share with the world. On the off chance that she’s not thinking about space and the universe, Kirsten loves to appreciate a good colourful sunset. After a long day of research and content creation, she loves to relax and recharge on the couch, watching reality television. Get the cheese board ready and pour a glass of wine because Bachie is on!

Kirsten has been involved in multiple topics of research, from Aboriginal Astronomy to cannibalistic galaxies and galactic archaeology. She is currently working at Swinburne University of Technology and OzGrav, having completed her PhD at UNSW, which explored more about the history and formation of the Milky Way galaxy and is very excited to expand humankind’s knowledge of the Universe.

BlueSky: @AstroKirsten

Dr. Shanika Galaudage is Space Australia's Social Media Coordinator, helping bring you the cool space content we have to offer.

In her spare time, she likes playing chess, making desserts and papercrafting. A number of her papercraft projects are space-inspired, and through this work, she hopes to reach more people and share her passion for astrophysics with the odd space fact here and there.

Currently based in the USA, Shanika has completed her PhD from Monash University and is currently working at CIERA + Adler Planetarium. Her research involves using gravitational waves to understand more about the populations of black holes and neutron stars - her favourite being neutron stars, but don't tell anyone, it's supposed to be a secret!

BlueSky: @AstroNerdika

Fiona (or as we like to call her - just "Fi") is Space Australia's Creative Designer - having put together the beautiful concepts you see on our platform.

Based in Sydney, Fi loves books, art and walking around. With an initial interest in fine arts from a young age, she studied Visual Communication at UTS to explore practical applications of creativity to brands, products and experiences. And while she's not fully ambidextrous, Fi learned to write her first language with her right hand, even though she is actually left-handed.

Fi is a fan of science fiction, as a way of imagining possible futures of humanity's relationship with the greater universe.

Currently a design consultant in visual and interaction design, Fi is working with a range of Australian and international enterprises.

Instagram: @fio_li

SwitchCase Pty Ltd is Space Australia's technology partner - providing our digital consulting, design, development and support services. 

The folks at SwitchCase are an enthusiastic bunch of technologists who are determined to disrupt the way people interact with technology. 

The team supports Space Australia with CMS build/management and application development, but we're also working together on future projects with machine learning and AI.

When not working, the SwitchCase team is usally found hanging out with us; somewhere in the World of Warcraft arena or participating in weekend hackathons like NASA SpaceApps challenge or GovHack.

For the record, they also geek out at all the space things we do, and we geek out at all the cool tech things they do. 

Write to us

Send Media Releases to: admin@spaceaustralia.com

Request to become a contributor: admin@spaceaustralia.com

General enquiries: admin@spaceaustralia.com

Social