Sustainability is becoming core to big business. CSIRO’s Chief Scientist, Professor Bronwyn Fox, is concerned that Australia is at risk of being cut out of global supply chains if we cannot provide evidence of reducing our carbon emissions. She seeks to leverage our mining sector’s use of digitisation, automation, and control for on-shore manufacturing, creating a suite of technologies that change the way we think about time and space.

Industry 4.0 is the next industrial revolution, utilising digitalisation to create a smarter, self-correcting manufacturing processes. Bringing this new industrial age together with science is Professor Bronwyn Fox, winner of the 2020 Medal for Excellence in Scientific Research. Her journey with carbon fibre production saw the develop a more efficient fabrications process for composite materials, and also had her involved with Quickstep and their new composite material process. At the time a small start-up, Quickstep is now the largest Australian independent manufacturer of composite materials, and Bronwyn took this entrepreneurial mindset and founded Deakin University’s Carbon Nexus facility. Professor Bronwyn Fox continued her research into renewable carbon fibre and established yet another facility – the National Industry 4.0 Testlab – which focuses on 3D printing of composite materials.