Speakers
Anna-Maria Arabia OAM
Prof Elanor Huntington
Prof Patrick McGorry AO
Nim de Swardt
Session
Four of Australia's most consequential scientific voices in one conversation
Purpose: Australia grows world-class minds and world-changing ideas, yet often hesitates to claim its global impact. This session makes a radical case: our greatest opportunity isn’t just exporting resources—it’s leveraging our "brain trust" to solve the world’s most pressing challenges.
Discussion: This conversation goes beyond theory to expose where Australia’s biggest breakthroughs are accelerating, where innovation is stalling, and where critical funding gaps remain unresolved. The panel will identify the catalytic-capital opportunities too early, complex, or unconventional for traditional funding models — but too important to ignore.
Outcomes: A high-conviction map of the most important opportunities shaping Australia’s future in science. The session concludes with a direct challenge to the room from some of the country’s most senior institutional voices: what must be backed now to ensure Australia leads globally, rather than follows.
Anna-Maria Arabia is a senior executive and strategic leader with more than 25 years’ experience at the intersection of research, policy, government and global affairs. Known as a change agent who combines intellectual depth with practical judgement, she has shaped some of Australia’s most consequential science policy decisions and built enduring partnerships across the public, private, philanthropic and international sectors.
Today, as CEO of the Australian Council on AI Strategy, Anna-Maria is helping shape AI policy in Australia’s national interest and in the global public interest.
As CEO of the Australian Academy of Science for a decade, Anna-Maria led significant transformation through a period of disruption. She played an instrumental role in supporting national decision-making during the COVID-19 pandemic; advanced science as a tool of statecraft from the Asia-Pacific to the United Nations; helped establish the Pacific Academy of Sciences; and ensured science remained influential in national security, defence, law, health and technology policy debates in Australia and abroad.
A former neuroscientist, Anna-Maria began her career in medical research in Australia and internationally. Her career spans scientific research, the Australian Public Service, political advisory roles and senior executive leadership across social and economic portfolios, giving her a rare breadth of experience and a deep understanding of government, business, philanthropy, the media and the research sector.
She currently serves on the University of Canberra Council and the boards of the Australian Science Media Centre and the Australian Advisory Board on Competitiveness. She is also a Visiting Fellow at the ANU National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science and a member of Chief Executive Women.
Anna-Maria holds the Medal of the Order of Australia for services to science and the distinction of Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy, reflecting recognition from two nations for a career defined by impact.
She established Scientia Advisory to bring knowledge and know-how to decisions that shape the future, continuing her commitment to ensuring evidence informs the decisions that matter.
Professor Elanor Huntington is the Deputy Chief Executive at CSIRO where she leads strategy and external engagement for CSIRO. She joined CSIRO in November 2021 as Executive Director, Digital, National Facilities and Collections, where she led the organisation’s data-focused research, development, and digital capability, and was responsible for major national research infrastructure, including the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre, the Marine National Facility, and the Australia Telescope National Facility.
Professor Huntington holds a PhD in experimental quantum optics and is an established senior leader with several Board appointments. Prior to joining CSIRO, Professor Huntington was Dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science at the Australian National University, where she drove significant transformation within the College and across the sector. She is passionate about raising the profile of STEM in the community, breaking down barriers to participation, and attracting diverse talent to the field.
Professor Patrick McGorry AO is one of the world’s most influential leaders in youth mental health, internationally recognised for reshaping how mental illness is understood and treated in young people. He is Executive Director, Orygen, Australia’s Centre of Excellence in Youth Mental Health, and a Founding Director, headspace, which has transformed access to care across Australia and beyond. McGorry’s pioneering work in early intervention has informed clinical practice and policy worldwide. In 2024, he led a global consortium of world-leading experts to deliver a definitive analysis of youth mental health, published in The Lancet Psychiatry. He was named Australian of the Year in 2010.
Nim de Swardt chairs the PWN Family Wealth Peer Group (QLD) and is Australia’s leading family storyteller. For 17 years, Nim has been cultivating Narrative Capital™ within significant families. Formerly the world’s first Chief Next Generation Officer at a US$16B, seventh-generation family enterprise and Guest Faculty at the Modern Elder Academy, teaching ‘Intergenerational Wisdom Sharing’. Nim draws on two decades in communications, narrative psychology, narrative therapy, storytelling science, and human-centred design. She is currently completing her Master’s research on how narrative practices can build legacy capital in significant families.
Associate Professor Clare Arnott is a Staff Specialist Cardiologist at St Vincent’s Hospital Sydney and Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. She is the Pagent Family Director of Heart Lung Clinical Research at St Vincent’s Hospital Sydney. She is a clinical triallist in Cardio-kidney-metabolic medicine and the Director of the Global Cardiovascular Program at the George Institute for Global health.
A/Prof. Arnott obtained her MBBS (Hons) and PhD at the University of Sydney, and her medical training at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and Prince of Wales Hospital. She has fellowships in Women’s Cardiovascular Disease (Churchill Fellowship, Mayo Clinic and Stanford University USA); echocardiography (US echocardiography board certified 2019), and cardiac MRI (RPA, 2016), and she established Australia's first Women's Heart Clinic (RPA hospital). She currently holds an MRFF Investigator Grant and a NSW health fellowship. She was awarded the Cardiovascular Research Network (CVRN) Ministerial rising star award for academic excellence in 2022. In addition, she has received >$35 million in peer review funding from NHMRC, MRFF and the National Heart Foundation.
She has published >140 peer reviewed manuscripts, has served as the national Clinical Stream Lead for the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand Annual Scientific Meeting, is an Associate Editor for Heart Lung and Circulation, is an Executive team Member of Australia and New Zealand Alliance for CV trials, and is a Fellow of European Society of Cardiology and CSANZ.