Tall Poppies in the Spotlight

The Calvacade of Australian Scientists

Professor Allan Snyder, Director of the Centre for the Mind, has been honoured as one of the top Australian scientists of the 20th Century.

The Tall Poppy Dinner 2000 (Melbourne 18 May) celebrated thirteen of Australia's tall poppies in Science in the the Calvacade of Australian Scientists of the 20th Century.

The Tall Poppy Campaign celebrates supreme excellence in intellectual endeavour and is the initiative of the Australian Institute of Political Science. The blue ribbon selection committee included Sir Gustav Nossal, Australian of the Year and Robin Batterham, AustraliaÕs Chief Scientist, with recommendations from the Academy of Science, CSIRO and others.

The scientists honoured in this year's calvacade were

WILLIAM FARRER (1845-1906): Agriculturalist and wheat breeder
LAWRENCE HARGRAVE (1850-1915): Pioneer aviator: inventor of the box kite
DR THOMAS BANCROFT (1860-1933): Tropical Medicine Physician, Parasitologist
SIR DOUGLAS MAWSON (1882-1958): Australia's greatest Antarctic explorer
SIR IAN WARK (1899-1985): Chemist and Mineralogist
DR JOSEPH PAWSEY (1908-1962): Radio astronomer and radio physicist
PROF GRAEME M. CLARK (b. 1935): Otolaryngologist. Inventor of the bionic ear
PROF ALLAN SNYDER: Optical physicist and visual scientist
PROF SUZANNE CORY (b. 1942) Molecular geneticist
PROF JERRY ADAMS (b 1940): Molecular geneticist
PROF FIONA STANLEY (b. 1946). Paediatrician and epidemiologist.
DR J ROBIN WARREN (b. 1937) Pathologist
PROF BARRY MARSHALL (b. 1951) Gastroenterologist