Centre Member Profile

Madhu Bhaskaran
Employer: RMIT University
Centre Role: Chief Investigator
Job Title in TMOS: Node Leader (Manipulate), Equity and Diversity Director
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Research Interests:
- Stretchable and conformal devices – electronics and photonics
- Wearable sensors
- Dielectric metasurfaces

Education:
Doctor of Philosophy, Electronic Materials Engineering, 2009, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
Master of Engineering, Microelectronic Engineering, 2005, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
Bachelor of Engineering, Electronics and Communication Engineering, 2004, P.S.G. College of Technology, Coimbatore, India
Biography:

Professor Madhu Bhaskaran co-leads the Functional Materials and Microsystems Research Group at RMIT University. She has won several awards and fellowships for her research including competitive Australian Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowship (2010-2014) and Australian Research Council DECRA Fellowship (2016-2018). She has been named as one of Top 10 Innovators under 35 for Asia (MIT Technology Review 2016).

A staunch advocate for diversity and inclusion, Madhu is a co-founder of the Women Researchers’ Network at RMIT University and has contributed her expertise on the Expert Working Group for the Women in STEM Decadal Plan. She has served on the Board of Directors with Women in STEMM Australia since 2015 and also serves on the Engineering for Australia Taskforce.

Her research interests include functional oxide thin films, wearable technologies and conformal devices. In 2017 she was recognised with the Eureka Prize for Outstanding Early Career Researcher. In 2018, she won the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering’s Batterham Medal and the APEC Science Prize for Innovation, Research and Education. She strives to translate her fundamental research results to impactful applications through collaborations with industry. She has five patents for breakthroughs in the creation of stretchable oxide devices, innovative coatings for smart windows, and next-generation sensing devices.

In October 2020 she was recognised by the Asian-Australian Leadership Summit as the Science and Medicine category winner for their 40 Under 40 Most Influential Asian-Australians awards.