Category Archives: Lectures

Grassroots innovation: celebrating AgResearch’s advances in endophyte science

Linda Johnson and David Hume

7.00 pm Tuesday, 17 June, Palmerston North Central Library, George Street, Palmerston North

A Manawatū-based research team from AgResearch has recently won the prestigious Prime Minister’s Science Prize for their decades-long work developing new endophytes that enhance ryegrass – the most commonly sown pasture grass on New Zealand farms. Endophytes are microorganisms that live within plants, benefiting both the plant and the microorganism.

One of the endophytes the team discovered, known as AR37, promotes the growth of ryegrass and protects it from pests and diseases—without causing significant health issues or lowered productivity in grazing animals—delivering significant advantages for the farming sector.

Come along to support your regional winner of this prestigious prize and hear the fascinating story about their research journey – one that has had a profound impact on New Zealand’s agricultural sector and economy.

2025 Earle Lecture

Trumping Climate Change!

Ralph Sims

7.30 pm Wednesday, 11 June, Speirs Centre, Featherston Street, Palmerston North

Held jointly with Engineering New Zealand

New Zealand’s emissions per capita are around the 12th highest in the world. Reducing them has proved challenging, and meeting our internationally agreed targets is looking unlikely. So, is there any hope for future generations? There has to be. A lot has happened since the 2016 Royal Society Te Apārangi report ‘Transition to a Low-Carbon Economy for NZ’. The potential for a low-carbon future remains, but achieving it won’t be easy.

Professor Emeritus Ralph Sims began his energy research at Massey University in the early 1970s, making and testing biodiesel. In 2001, while on the Board of the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA), he helped establish New Zealand’s first energy efficiency and renewable energy strategy. From 2006 to 2010 he was seconded to the International Energy Agency in Paris. He chaired the panel of experts for the Royal Society Te Apārangi 2016 publication ‘Transition to a low-carbon economy for New Zealand’. He has been a lead author for five Mitigation Assessment Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. In 2013, Professor Sims was appointed part-time to the Scientific and Technical Advisory Panel of the World Bank’s Global Environment Facility, Washington DC, for a 6-year term. He became a Companion of the NZ Order of Merit in the King’s Birthday Honours list in 2023, for services to sustainable energy and climate mitigation.

The Earle Lecture is held every two years to celebrate the work of Professors Dick and Mary Earle, and their contribution to the profession of engineering in New Zealand and abroad.

Martian monsters, giant landslides, and recipes for disaster: Landslide curiosities, hazards, and a slippery future

Sam McColl

7.30 pm Tuesday, 20 May, Palmerston North Central Library, George Street, Palmerston North

Held jointly with the Geoscience Society of New Zealand

Sam McColl is a quantitative geomorphologist who applies cross-disciplinary approaches to solve problems spanning natural hazards, agriculture, engineering, and environment, with primary expertise in landslide processes and Quaternary geomorphology. He is the Engineering Geology Team Leader at GNS Science and the current President of the Geoscience Society of New Zealand.

Sam will take you on a foray through the fascinating world of landslides, from the unbelievably large landslides on Mars to common problems in your back yard. The talk will explore why New Zealand has so many landslides and why they cost more than any other natural hazard. Some thoughts will be given to the big questions in landslide science and projections for landslides in a warming world.