Dr Rachael Padman

Biography

Rachael Padman did her first degree in Electrical Engineering, at Monash University. She then worked for two years at CSIRO Division of Radio physics in Sydney, doing research on antennas for radio astronomy, before coming to the Cavendish for her PhD in mm-wave astronomy and instrumentation. She held an 1851 Research Fellowship, and then spent two years in Berkeley as a Miller Research Fellow, before returning to the Cavendish in 1984 as Deputy Project Scientist for the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in Hawaii. She was appointed a University Lecturer in 1998. From 2005 to 2009 she was primarily involved in the administration of teaching in the Department of Physics. In 2009 she was elected to the University Council, and sat on the Council and General Board until the end of 2016. She also served as the School of the Physical Sciences Director of Education from 2008 to 2014. She Chaired the Board of Graduate Studies and the UIS Operations Committee, and sat on the University’s Information Services Committee and the Environmental and Sustainability Strategy Committee.

Research

Millimetre wave optics and receiver systems; Low-mass star formation, and in particular jets and outflows from young stars; Spectral-line data reduction software.