McArthur heads the materials science and engineering centre at Deakin’s Waurn Ponds campus with over 200 staff, and a focus on the themes of “Re-designing materials for a circular economy” and “Imparting materials with extraordinary functionality”.

Its work runs across the energy, mining, environment, health, transport, textiles and manufacturing sectors.

The university’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research, Professor Julie Owens, said,

“McArthur had the right skills and background to help address specific industry needs, and had done so in surface and bioengineering, hydrogen, and emissions-free energy.

Deakin prides itself on the innovative translation of our ideas and research into new services, products, policies and capabilities.

Sally is commercially-orientated and globally connected. She excels at applying fundamental research to the design of innovative new products.”

According to a statement from Deakin, McArthur’s background includes Research+ Science Leader in Biomedical Manufacturing at CSIRO from 2017 to 2021, playing a key role in establishing the Australian National Fabrication Facility Victoria (ANFF-Vic) Biointerface Engineering Hub, and being made Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering last year for work in industry-academic research collaborations.

She was most recently Director of the Manufacturing Futures Research Institute at Swinburne University.