Congratulations to Australian Space Awards 2025 winners, Anita Ho-Baillie, Anne Bettens and Tim Parsons!
Anita Ho-Baillie received the Academic of the Year Award 2025. Anita, who won the award for Space Scientist in 2024, is the John Hooke Chair of Nanoscience at Sydney Nano in the University of Sydney.
Anita leads EurokaPower, winners in the Waratah Seed payload competition in 2021. EurokaPower’s perovskite solar cells have been successfully demonstrated on the Waratah Seed-1 mission.
Dr Anne Bettens received the Rising Star of the Year Award - SME for the startup company Deneb Space. Anne co-founded Deneb Space with Dr Xueliang Bai and Professor Iver Cairns from CUAVA and the University of Sydney School of Physics, and Dr Xiaofeng Wu, from the University’s School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering.
Deneb Space designed the ‘E-mag’, innovative technology for rapidly stabilising tumbling satellites and changing satellite orientation, which has also been demonstrated successfully on the Waratah Seed-1 mission.
Tim Parsons, a founding member of the Waratah Seed Consortium and Expert in Residence for the National Space Industry Hub at Cicada Innovations, won well-deserved recognition as Mentor of the Year, and a shout out to Nick Manser from SmartSat CRC, winner of the Engineer Of the Year - Academic/Research award. SmartSat CRC are Foundation Mission Partners of the Waratah Seed-1.
The Waratah Seed Consortium, led out of the School of Physics by CUAVA, was a finalist in Research and Development Project of the Year. CUAVA and Waratah Seed engineers Xueliang Bai and Patrick Oppel were both finalists for Engineer of the Year - Academic / Research, and Patrick Oppel also received a nomination for Rising Star of the year - Enterprise.
See the full list of 2025 Winners.
Photo L-R: CUAVA and Waratah Seed engineers Patrick Oppel and Xueliang Bai, Centre Operations Manager Robert Steel, Shoshana Fogelman from the University of Sydney Research Portfolio, Anne Bettens, Anita Ho-Baillie, CUAVA and Waratah Seed Director Iver Cairns and Katherine Bennell-Pegg: Australia’s first female astronaut and the first astronaut to qualify under the Australian Flag.
