Alex Barnes awarded a Woolf Fisher Scholarship

Western Springs College – Ngā Puna o Waiōrea is proud to announce that former student Alex Barnes has been awarded a Woolf Fisher Scholarship to the University of Cambridge to study a PhD in Physics. The scholarship recognises outstanding academic ability, integrity, leadership, boldness of vision as well as other qualities admired by Sir Woolf Fisher.  Alex has been accepted to Trinity College, following in the footsteps of notable NZ physicist Ernest Rutherford who was a fellow there.

Alex attended Western Springs College from 2015 -2019 and fondly remembers how it has shaped him. In particular a Y13 physics trip to the Photon Factory at the University of Auckland, inspiring him to work there for the past 4 years, and attending the Professor Harry Messel International Science School in Sydney. Both of these experiences exposed Alex to exciting scientific research, igniting his passion for it.

At Cambridge Alex’s research will focus on 2D materials, a set of materials that are: slated to reduce global energy consumption through their catalytic ability, make novel and more efficient transistors, create new superconductors, and enable quantum technologies. The most famous 2D material, graphene, can be made from benign graphite commonly found in a pencil. When graphite is exfoliated to a single atomic layer, it transforms to the most tensile strong material and where electrons behave as if they have no mass.

You can read more about Alex’s research and the Woolf Fisher Scholarship here