2017/18 Vacation Scholarships
Job Title: / CSIRO Undergraduate Vacation Scholarships – Agriculture & FoodReference No: / 43462
Classification: / CSOF1.1
Stipend: / $1462.77 per fortnight (before tax)
Location: / Please refer to the list of Projects at the end of this document
Tenure: / Typically 10 weeks from 27 November 2017 to 2 February 2018
Role Purpose: / The 2017/18 Vacation Scholarship Program is designed to provide students with the opportunity to work on real-world problems in a leading R&D organisation. Students complete a self-contained research project; they also join with their peers in skills development activities, and give a short talk to a one-day symposium at the end of the program.
Participation in the Vacation Scholarship Program has influenced previous scholarship holders in their choice of further study and future career options. Many have gone on to pursue a PhD in CSIRO or to build a successful research career within CSIRO, a university or industry.
Project Description: / Please refer to the list of Projects at the end of this document.
If you require more information please contact the person listed for the project.
How to Apply: / You will be required to:
1. select your top 2 research projects in order of preference;
2. submit a resume/cover letter (as one document) which includes:
· the reasons why the research project/s you have selected are of interest to you; and how your previous skills/knowledge and experience meets the project requirements;
· an outline of your longer-term career aspirations and detail how this program will help you achieve them; and
· using the project numbers listed below, list in order of preference, all of the projects you are interested in.
3. upload your academic results in the ‘Requested Information’ field.
Referees: If you would like to include referees (either work or university lecturers/ tutors) in your application, please add their name and contact details into your resume.
If you experience difficulties applying online call 1300 984 220 and someone will be able to assist you. Outside business hours please email: .
Please do not email your application. Applications received via this method may not be considered.
Sponsored by:
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There are 16 projects available in Agriculture & Food:
Project No. / Location / Project Title (see the following pages for more information)Agriculture & Food 1 / St Lucia (QBP) / Assessing the safety of commercial food for Coeliac disease
Agriculture & Food 2 / Myall Vale, NSW / Measuring nitrate-N in real-time using a hand held handheld spectrometer in cotton.
Agriculture & Food 3 / Black Mountain (Canberra) / Raiders of the Vavilov ark: sleuthing new photosynthetic traits from the past
Agriculture & Food 4 / Black Mountain (Canberra) / Energy efficient wheat roots - shedding light on the role of root anatomy and nodal roots
Agriculture & Food 5 / Coopers Plains, QLD / The effect of ageing on the formation of bioactive peptides in meat
Agriculture & Food 6 / Black Mountain (Canberra) / TILLING for HealthiER Starch
Agriculture & Food 7 / Myall Vale, NSW / Measuring Heat Tolerance in Cotton: Designing Physiological tools for Crop Breeding
Agriculture & Food 8 / Myall Vale, NSW / Does soil wetness affect the performance of a spray-on biodegradable polymer membrane?
Agriculture & Food 9 / Black Mountain (Canberra) / Capturing more soil phosphorus by enhancing the nutrient foraging response of plants
Agriculture & Food 10 / St Lucia (QBP) / Relationship between crown rot resistance and drought tolerance in cereals
Agriculture & Food 11 / St Lucia (QBP) / Evaluation of the Performance of One Machine Learning Method in Cattle Behaviour Classifications
Agriculture & Food 12 / North Ryde, NSW / Coriander aversion in humans: development of a rapid testing method and assessment of coriander compounds in a human population
Agriculture & Food 13 / St Lucia (QBP) / Saving the Great Barrier Reef from Space
Agriculture & Food 14 / Floreat / In planta characterisation of endophytic biocontrol agents
Agriculture & Food 15 / Black Mountain (Canberra) / Visualising the pH of plant cell walls using fluorescent reporter proteins
Agriculture & Food 16 / Armidale, NSW / Impacts of rearing environments on behaviour and fear responses of free-range pullets
Select the Project Numbers above to take you directly to the project details, including relevant fields of study, Project Duties/Tasks and Locations for these projects (which are on the following pages).
Please read though these and decide which 2 projects are your preferred choices (Agriculture & Food 1, Agriculture & Food 2, etc) as you will need to enter these into your application. You will also be requested to list all of the projects you are interested in (in order of preference) in your application. If you require more information please contact the person listed for each project.
Note: CSIRO are advertising vacation scholarships by the different business units we have. You can apply for projects in more than one CSIRO business unit, but your application for Agriculture & Food should only refer to Information Management and Technology projects, such as Agriculture & Food 1, Agriculture & Food 2, etc.
Project Number
/ Agriculture & Food - Vacation Scholarships Project DetailsAgriculture & Food 1
/ Project TitleAssessing the safety of commercial food for Coeliac disease
Project Description
In this project, proteomics and specifically LC-MS/MS will be used to detect and quantify gluten proteins in a wide range of commercial food products. The student will develop extraction methods that are optimised to different food matrices and help protect those people that suffer from Coeliac disease.
Gluten is the collective name for a class of proteins found in wheat (glutenins/gliadins), rye (secalins), barley (hordeins) and oats (avenins). Dietary gluten is incompletely degraded by human gastrointestinal peptidases. In people affected by coeliac disease (CD) the resulting peptides trigger an immune response resulting in intestinal inflammation and mucosal damage. CD affects ~70 million people globally and the only current treatment for CD and gluten intolerance is lifelong avoidance of dietary gluten, however, such diets are costly, low in fibre and high in sugar, which in themselves are health risks. The worldwide market for gluten-free products is predicted to grow by over 10% pa to US$9.0 billion by 2020. Gluten-free foods are now commonplace, however, it is difficult to accurately determine the gluten content of products claiming to be gluten-free using current immunochemical methodologies as the antibodies are non-specific and show cross-reactivity.
CSIRO scientists have successfully applied proteomics and specifically LC-MS/MS to the detection and quantification of gluten peptides in barley (hordeins), wheat (gliadins and glutenins), rye (secalins) and oats (avenins). This project will expand these studies to apply this cutting-edge technology to detect any of the gluten-containing cereal grains in raw or processed food products. The diverse range of food products we consume, from breakfast cereals to ready-to-eat meals, present challenges with protein extraction which will be explored during this study. Accurate quantification and identification of the source (i.e., grain) and type (e.g., gluten) contamination is critical to the health and well-being of a subset of the population, including those affected by CD and non-coeliac gluten sensitivity.
Project Duties/Tasks
The student will develop skills in protein chemistry through extraction of gluten from a range of food products using existing laboratory protocols and expand on these through comparative analyses. The student will learn to use state-of-the-art liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) for gluten analysis, and develop bioinformatics skills through analysis of the data to identify and quantify proteins that are harmful to people who suffer from Coeliac disease.
Relevant Fields of Study
Biology, chemistry, physics, analytical sciences, biotechnology, bioinformatics or a combination of these.
Location: St Lucia (QBP), QLD
Contact: Michelle Colgrave phone on (07) 3214 2697 or email
Project Number
/ Agriculture & Food - Vacation Scholarships Project DetailsAgriculture & Food 2
/ Project TitleMeasuring nitrate-N in real-time using a hand held handheld spectrometer in cotton.
Project Description
The project will utilise a new and emerging technology to analyse cotton plant tissue. The project will examine the accuracy and reliability of the technology. The data collected will be calibrated against traditional laboratory methodology and if found to be reliable could revolutionise cotton nutrient analysis.
The development of a handheld spectrometer has recently been the focus of media attention for its innovative method for analysing plant tissue in real-time. The microscope was built at the University of Newcastle and is capable of real-time analysis of plant tissue for various nutrients. The project would provide an opportunity for a student to learn more about the handheld spectrometer and compare the results with laboratory analysed plant tissue samples. The project will compare nitrogen partitioning of an old variety from the 90s with a new Bollgard III variety released in 2016. The development of a device that can measure in real-time in cotton would be a great asset to the industry. At present consultants remove petioles from a cotton crop for nitrogen status. It can often take 2 weeks for results to be returned. Often this is too late to ameliorate the nutrient deficiency and impacts yield. The development of a hand held device that could analyse plant tissue in real-time and provide results quickly for models like NutriLOGIC would be a significant tool for the cotton industry. Undertaking this research at the Australian Cotton Research Institute would provide a student with an exciting opportunity to be part of the digital agronomy frontier.
Project Duties/Tasks
Cotton samples will be removed and analysed at 3 different physiological stages during the 2017/18 season. The samples removed will be analysed using two techniques. The first method will use an emerging technology: handheld spectrometer. The second will use a known and accurate traditional wet laboratory method. A comparison of results will confirm if the emerging technology provides a viable real-time analysis allowing a proactive approach to addressing nutrient deficiencies.
Relevant Fields of Study
Cotton, Nutrients, Digital Agronomy.
Location: Myall Vale (Narrabri), NSW
Contact: Tim Weaver phone on (02) 6799 1594 or email
Project Number
/ Agriculture & Food - Vacation Scholarships Project DetailsAgriculture & Food 3
/ Project TitleRaiders of the Vavilov ark: sleuthing new photosynthetic traits from the past.
Project Description
The project seeks to evaluate and deploy a high-throughput method to phenotype photosynthetic traits in a global wheat collection. We will use the newly acquired state-of-the-art PhotosynQ® handheld device to explore photosynthetic parameters in the renowned Vavilov’s wheat diversity panel.
Wheat is the principal staple food worldwide, and it is grown on more land area than any other food crop. Australia is a major producer and exporter, being the crop with highest value to the Australian economy. Global demand for wheat is increasing due the growing human population and all over the world plant breeders and scientists are dedicated to breed for new high-yielding wheat varieties. Increasing the photosynthetic capacity of wheat is seen as a clear target in order to increase total biomass and thus yield. However the complexity of the photosynthesis process and the lack of high throughput screening methods for it has hampered the identification of varieties with improved assimilation rates of carbon dioxide.
This project aims to use the PhotosynQ to establish a high-throughput screening method for wheat photosynthesis. This sensor is a new, fast and easy-to-use high-tech device designed to measure multiple photosynthetic and leaf traits in vivo in just seconds. Our CSIRO Photosynthesis Team has acquired five units of PhotosynQ sensor and this project is designed to test its capabilities and compare its performance to slower, more expensive alternative methods. The student will be in charge of screening a unique population of diverse wheats collected by the notorious plant scientist Nikolai Vavilov more than 100 years ago. This population contains old varieties and landraces that have not undergone any domestication bottle neck and could potentially display a great and novel variability in photosynthetic performance.
This project is a great opportunity to any student to utilise the latest technology in plant phenotyping with a very special wheat collection. The student will learnt how to use the equipment and analyse the data, while contributing to capability development for future research at CSIRO to improve photosynthesis in wheat.
Project Duties/Tasks
· Review the literature and familiarize with the PhotosynQ device and with the glasshouse environment. Plants and equipment will be organised and ready prior to the student arrival.
· Design a protocol to phenotype the plants establishing best practice approaches and methods.
· Phenotype multiple leaves per plant of the wheat populations over development. Validate some of the measurements with alternative, well established methods.
· Analyse the data collected, compile report and prepare presentation.
Relevant Fields of Study
This project is more suitable for students interested in Plant Biology and Agriculture, who also like technology and computer-based data analysis.
Location: Black Mountain (Canberra), ACT
Contact: Gonzalo Estavillo phone on (02) 6246 5548 or email
Project Number
/ Agriculture & Food - Vacation Scholarships Project DetailsAgriculture & Food 4
/ Project TitleEnergy efficient wheat roots - shedding light on the role of root anatomy and nodal roots.
Project Description
Plant roots are essential for water and nutrient uptake from the soil, however, roots are costly in terms of resources invested in their structure and respiration. This project will investigate how various root traits (nodal root number and root anatomical traits) contribute to improve the energy efficiency of wheat plants.
Roots are solely responsible for the uptake of water and nutrients by plants, and a large proportion of the carbohydrates produced through daily photosynthesis are allocated to develop root systems and maintain their functions. One way to improve the yield of crop plants, such as wheat, is to improve the efficiency of their root systems, such that plants expend fewer resources for the same capacity for water and nutrient uptake.
Previous work has shown that root traits related to lower energy cost, such as reduced nodal root number, larger cortical cell size and reduced root cortical cell file number, improved maize production in unfavourable environments.
In this project the student will work with a diverse set of wheat genotypes, including old and new cultivars, and near-isogenic lines that vary at key genes. The genotypes will be grown in pots and hydroponics in growth cabinets, and also in the field. If time permits, roots can be collected from a field trial that is already set up. Individual plants will be sampled to count the number of nodal roots, scanned to determine root length and sectioned to measure anatomical traits by microscopy. The images will be processed using image analysis software to calculate root diameter, root cell size and root cell file number. Measurements of root and shoot dry matter as well as root respiration will be used to determine the carbon allocation to roots.
The ultimate aim of this work is to enhance energy efficiency in wheat by getting a handle on the importance of nodal root number and root anatomical traits in different genetic backgrounds.
Project Duties/Tasks
· Become familiar with the literature about nodal root numbers and root anatomical traits in relation to improving plant energy efficiency.
· Grow plants in growth cabinets, and sample plants to measure and compare root traits and energy efficiency.
· Analyse data and write the final report. Prepare the final presentation.
Relevant Fields of Study
Plant Biology, Plant Physiology, Plant Biotechnology, Agriculture
Location: Black Mountain (Canberra), ACT
Contact: Xiaoqing Li phone on (02) 6218 3493 or email
Project Number