MSOR Researcher awarded Rutherford Discovery Fellowship

MSOR Researcher awarded Rutherford Discovery Fellowship

Victoria University researchers have scooped three of this year’s Rutherford Discovery Fellowships. One of them being our very own Dr Dillon Mayhew.

Dr Dillon Mayhew is a Senior Lecturer in Victoria University's School of Mathematics, Statistics and Operations Research.

After completing undergraduate studies at Victoria, he received a prestigious Commonwealth Scholarship to complete a PhD in mathematics at the University of Oxford.

The Rutherford Discovery Fellowship will enable Dr Mayhew to continue his mathematics research into matroid and model theory, which he describes as 'computer-age geometry' and has applications in computer science.

He is also a talented musician and, in his spare time, plays French horn in the Wellington Orchestra. Dr Mayhew is currently visiting the United States, where he is working with colleagues in the mathematics department at Princeton University.

The Rutherford Discovery Fellowships support New Zealand’s most talented early- to mid-career researchers by providing financial support of $800,000 over a five-year period to investigate a particular research topic, and help them further their career in New Zealand.

The three Victoria University researchers are Dr Dillon Mayhew, who will continue his mathematics research in the field of matroids and model theory, Dr Robert McKay for the Antarctic ice Sheet-Southern Ocean interactions during greenhouse worlds of the past 23 million years – and consequences for New Zealand climate, and Dr Elizabeth Stanley who will explore the changing status of human rights in New Zealand.

Victoria University Vice-Chancellor Professor Pat Walsh says the Fellowship awards are a significant achievement for the researchers involved. "These awards, set up by the Government in 2010, will allow some of our best and brightest researchers achieve their potential to make an enormous contribution to New Zealand.

"I am delighted and proud that three of the ten Fellowships have been awarded to Victoria University researchers this year. It is immensely satisfying to see those who have dedicated their career to discovery and world-leading research being supported and recognised in this way."

The fellowships are administered by the Royal Society of New Zealand.