STAFF PROFILE
Professor Michelle Spencer
Professor Michelle Spencer is the Deputy Director - Centre for Digital Innovation STEM. Her research expertise is in computational materials chemistry and physics.
Professor Spencer’s research specialises in computational chemistry. She focuses on using density functional theory and ab initio molecular dynamics simulations to determine the structure, dynamic properties and surface reactions of materials and nanomaterials for applications in electronic devices, gas sensors and batteries.
She collaborates with industry and local and international researchers and has secured research grants from both industry and government. She collaborates extensively with Defence Science and Technology (DST) and the CSIRO. She is also a Associate Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence in Future Low-Energy Electronics Technologies (FLEET).
Professor Spencer is passionate about digital innovations in science education, and has developed a mobile application, called Chirality-2, for teaching concepts in undergraduate chemistry. The app is available to download for free on the Google Play and Apple stores.
Michelle has been awarded multiple university, national and international teaching grants and awards for excellence in HE teaching and digital innovations, including a 2019 AAUT Citation for Excellence in Teaching.
As the Associate Dean of Applied Chemistry & Environmental Science, Professor Spencer is a member of the School of Science Executive and provides tactical leadership for staff within the Discipline. She is responsible for leading her Discipline to deliver on College research and teaching strategy.
Michelle is also an active researcher and has won competitive grants from the Australian Research Council (ARC), the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) and several national supercomputing facilities. She has a strong interest in materials science, particularly for sustainable energy technologies.
Professional Affiliations/Membership
- Fellow, and Chartered Chemist, The Royal Australian Chemical Institute (FRACI CChem)
- Member, Australian Council of Environmental Deans and Directors (ACEDD)
- Member, Australian Heads of Chemistry group
- Member, The Australian Institute of Physics (AIP)
- Member, The Australian Nanotechnology Network (ANN)
- PhD, LaTrobe University
- B Sc(Hons) LaTrobe University
- Taylor, P.,Tawfik, S.,Spencer, M. (2023). Ferroelectric van der Waals heterostructures of CuInP2S6 for non-volatile memory device applications In: Nanotechnology, 34, 1 - 9
- Shabbir, B.,Liu, J.,Krishnamurthi, V.,Tran, K.,Abbas, S.,Khan, H.,Walia, S.,Li, Y.,Spencer, M.,Mahmood, N., et al.,, . (2022). Soft X-ray Detectors Based on SnS Nanosheets for the Water Window Region In: Advanced Functional Materials, 32, 1 - 8
- Abbas, S.,Tran, H.,Spencer, M. (2022). Improving sensing of formaldehyde using ZnO nanostructures with surface-adsorbed oxygen In: Nanoscale Advances, 4, 546 - 561
- Zuraqi, K.,Zavabeti, A.,Clarke-Hannaford, J.,Murdoch, B.,Shah, K.,Spencer, M.,McConville, C.,Daeneke, T.,Chiang, K. (2022). Direct Conversion of CO2 to Solid Carbon by Liquid Metals In: Energy and Environmnetal Science, 15, 595 - 600
- Ahmed, T.,Kuriakose, S.,Abbas, S.,Mayes, E.,Mazumder, A.,Balendhran, S.,Spencer, M.,Akinwande, D.,Bhaskaran, M.,Sriram, S.,Walia, S. (2022). Mixed Ionic-Electronic Charge Transport in Layered Black-Phosphorus for Low-Power Memory In: Advanced Functional Materials, 32, 1 - 11
- Kumari, S.,Chouhan, A.,Sharma, O.,Abbas, S.,Tran, K.,Spencer, M.,Bhargava, S.,Walia, S.,Ray, A.,Khatri, O. (2022). Surface Functionalization of WS2Nanosheets with Alkyl Chains for Enhancement of Dispersion Stability and Tribological Properties In: ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 14, 1334 - 1346
- Rahman, M.,Cai, L.,Abbas, S.,Tucker, S.,Burton, A.,Perera, G.,Spencer, M.,Walia, S.,Sriram, S.,Gutruf, P.,Bhaskaran, M. (2022). Nicotine Sensors for Wearable Battery-Free Monitoring of Vaping In: ACS Sensors, 7, 82 - 88
- Greaves, T.,Dharmadana, D.,Yalcin, D.,Clarke-Hannaford, J.,Christofferson, A.,Murdoch, B.,Han, H.,Brown, S.,Weber, C.,Spencer, M.,McConville, C.,Drummond, C.,Jones, L. (2022). Electrochemical Stability of Zinc and Copper Surfaces in Protic Ionic Liquids In: Langmuir, 38, 4633 - 4644
- Osborne, D.,Breedon, M.,Spencer, M. (2022). Towards higher electrochemical stability of electrolytes: lithium salt design through in silico screening In: Journal of Materials Chemistry A, 10, 13254 - 13265
- Albarakati, S.,Tan, C.,Algarni, M.,Partridge, J.,Spencer, M.,Farrar, L.,Wang, X.,Wang, L., et al, . (2022). Electric Control of Exchange Bias Effect in FePS3-Fe5GeTe2van der Waals Heterostructures In: Nano Letters, 22, 6166 - 6172
7 PhD Completions7 PhD Current Supervisions
- Developing the proton battery and proton flow reactor systems for energy storage. Funded by: Study Melbourne Research Partnerships Program from (2021 to 2022)
- Driving Innovation in Chemistry Worldwide through the Creation of an Augmented Realty App. Funded by: ACDS Teaching and Learning Grant scheme from (2021 to 2022)
- Discovery of Novel 2D Multiferroic Materials for Nanoscale Devices - (FLEET Strategic Research Seed Funding). Funded by: FLEET Strategic Research Seed Funding Program from (2020 to 2022)
- A proton flow reactor system for large-scale electrical energy storage and bulk export of hydrogenated carbon based material. Funded by: 073-Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) R&D Grants 2018 onwards from (2018 to 2021)
- Exploring piezoelectricity of two-dimensional nanocrystals and nanodevices. Funded by: ARC Discovery Projects 2018 from (2018 to 2021)