La Trobe launches next generation teaching and research
facilities Top laboratories in North America and Europe and
gigantic synchrotrons in Australia or overseas are now within
reach of La Trobe science students and research scientists. This
remote access is possible thanks to a futuristic computerised
‘Visualisation Laboratory’ opened on the Melbourne Campus
earlier this year. It’s the first in Australia designed around a
Virtual ‘Beam Line’ (the experimental front-end of a
synchrotron) and serves as a template for others to come. The
new lab, which looks a bit like a multi-media Imax cinema,
serves as a remote training space, classroom and research node.
It teaches undergraduate students the latest in instrument-based
science and boosts global research opportunities for
postgraduate students and staff. ‘It extends students’
laboratory experiences beyond those they encounter in their
daily experimental work on campus,’ says Head of Physics,
Associate Professor Paul Pigram. Built at a cost of quarter of a
mi